


The Piano Man's Elegy

by RainbowKittyPrincess (PrincessSmuttButt)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Cheating, Daddy Issues, Detective!Iwaizumi, Everyone Is Gay, M/M, Oikawa Is Petty AF, Tragedy, Unrequited Love, baby tobio, everyone is sad, i love ushijima, injuries, iwaoi - Freeform, pianist!Oikawa, ushioi - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-11
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-10-17 11:14:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 27
Words: 81,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10592856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrincessSmuttButt/pseuds/RainbowKittyPrincess
Summary: Tooru Oikawa, at twenty-four years old, is hailed as one the greatest concert pianists of all time. So when he is forced by extenuating circumstances to give up his career as a pianist, he spirals into hopelessness and confusion. Then, the day after his last concert, he runs into Hajime Iwaizumi--the best friend and lover who he thought was dead for six years. Upon their unexpected reunion, Tooru finds himself thrown into a complicated, emotional web of unrequited love, redemption, longing, and secrets. Things only get more complicated when he meets Hajime's detective partner, the stoic and earnest Wakatoshi Ushijima, and he has to navigate a new world of beauty, pain, and his own selfishness.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hi everyone! 
> 
> welcome to my *second* Haikyuu story, "The Piano Man's Elegy." IwaOi is just such a great ship and I've been in the process of writing this story for months now. Oikawa is a complex character with a lot of dimensions, so it was quite a task to try and capture all those dimensions in writing. Hopefully I've done a good job :) 
> 
> There are explicitly sexual scenes (all consensual), but that's about it as far as content warnings go. 
> 
> NOTE: If you haven't read my other Haikyuu story, "Teach Me How To Swim," I would actually recommend doing that first because this story takes place in the same alternate universe, and some aspects of this story will make more sense if you've read that one (though it does deal with some really heavy topics). 
> 
> Now that all that's out of the way, I really hope you enjoy! The story is complete, with a total of 27 chapters, and I'll be updating once every 2-3 days. 
> 
> xoxo

**Chapter 1**

The people who had seen Tooru Oikawa play piano said that he could make you feel emotions you didn’t know existed. They said that his clair de lune made you weep, his gymnopedie made you dream, his prelude in c-sharp minor made you tremble, his piano concerto in e-minor made you lose yourself in a world of music that captured your heart and your soul and your very existence. They said that when you’re sitting in the back of the concert hall, desperate to rip your heart out and let the music surround it, you’re dying to see his face when he plays, because you know that it can’t be anything but breathtakingly beautiful. They said that even if you hate classical music, orchestras, concerts, music in general, he could make you love it, want it, need it.

The people who had seen Tooru Oikawa play piano said that he could take your breath away with a single arpeggio—no, a single chord. Control your emotions, set your heart ablaze with the tip of his fingers as they embedded themselves upon the white and black keys. They said that for the few hours you’re there, listening to him play, he makes you believe that you are no longer in control of your body, emotions, not even your own destiny—he’s the one who controls all of that. Whether an étude, a nocturne, a rhapsody or an elegy, each piece that he plays becomes your new favorite. Oh, how I want to hear him play for the rest of my life, you think. Just this one. But then you hear the next one and you think the same thing.

The people who had seen Tooru Oikawa play piano said that they could never listen to anybody else play piano ever again without thinking about how he, young and stupid and talented and not possibly human, would play it smoother, better, infinitely more beautifully.

“Jeez, Oikawa. Your fingers move so fast.”

“Well, they have to. That’s how the piece is meant to be played.”

“But...I mean, how do you do it?”

“Do what? Play this fast? Just practice.”

“No, not that. I know you practice. That’s why I barely see you.”

“Oh. Then how do I do what?”

“You make my chest hurt when you play. I don’t even like Mozart.”

“That wasn’t Mozart! How many times do I have to tell you? _Beethoven._ ”

“See? I couldn’t give less of a shit. And still, when you play...you make my chest hurt.”

“The way I see it, that’s only fair.”

“Oh yeah? How do you figure?”

“You make my chest hurt all the time. See, like that! Just by looking at me like that.”

“Yeah, well I’m gonna make it hurt more when I kick you.”

“Come on, Iwa-chan, don’t be so mean.”  

Music critics didn’t like him because he was unfairly good. They searched for ways to criticize his performances. Perhaps a little too fluid? Too sentimental? Not precise enough? But they could never find something legitimate to say about his music other than: perfect. His perfection made them hate him because he took away their ability to do that which they had trained all their lives to do. Other pianists aspired to be him, be better than him, kiss his fingertips and lick away the talent that was there. Or maybe bring their fingertips to his lips, begging that he breathe onto their skin the way that he could play the most difficult piece with incandescent effortlessness.

Tooru Oikawa was young, deemed perhaps the best pianist to have ever lived by those who ‘knew what they were talking about’ at the age of twenty. Now, at twenty-four, he was always hearing music. When he woke up in the morning, Mozart. When he brushed his teeth, Beethoven. When he ran his fingers through his hair and put in the expensive gel that he had come to obsess over, Schubert. When he read books, always fiction and never nonfiction, Satie. When he spoke to the people that were close to him, Tchaikovsky. When he went on walks under sunny skies, rainy skies, any skies, Rachmaninoff. And, for some reason, when he showered, Chopin. Always Chopin. Each person he met was accompanied with their own special melody. Sometimes, if they inspired him enough, he wrote the melody down. There was never a moment in his life, from the second he decided that he wanted to play piano and be the very best at it, that he wasn’t hearing music. Or, better yet, playing music.

“Do your fingers ever hurt? From playing so much?”

“Sometimes. My back, too. Sometimes my legs. Oh, and my head...”

“Shut up already, I didn’t ask to hear your sob story.”

“Oh, I feel light-headed...”

“Stop it.”

“I think I’m going to faint...! Catch me, Iwa-chan!”

“H-hey!”

“Thank you, thank you, Mr. Burly Arms! My savior.”

“You’re such a nuisance.”

“Am I? Am I really?”

“Yes.”

“But you caught me anyway.”

“I mean...yeah.”

“You could have just let me fall and crack my head open and then you’d never have to deal with me again.”

“Next time, I’ll do just that.”

“Careful. Next time, I might really faint.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”   

Once, when he was ten, he had to be sent to the emergency room in an ambulance because he didn’t leave the piano for 30 hours and was severely dehydrated.

His parents told him that they were proud of him at his hospital bedside.

Though, Tooru never told anybody that it wasn’t natural talent that gave him the abilities he had. He hadn’t been born with magic fingers, magic ears, a magic smile. No, not him, not Tooru Oikawa. He never told anybody that he’d made himself sick practicing, that for practically every day of his life he spent hours and hours and hours struggling to keep his back straight, pushing down on golden pedals, watching music notes swirl and blur before his eyes—he found that telling people he had had to practice more, surely more, than any other pianist before him, ruined the novelty. They weren’t as impressed. They liked him better if they thought he was naturally gifted, so he let them believe it. After all, who was he to take that from them?

Tooru was the only one who knew that he wasn’t naturally gifted, and he didn’t mind. In fact, he kind of liked that he was good enough to make people think he was born with it. He liked to imagine that if Rachmaninoff, his favorite composer, were still alive, he would walk up to him, shake his hand, and say to him, My, Mr. Oikawa, you really are a very good pianist. I feel grateful that there is someone like you to play my music. Спасибо. The idea always made him giddy, and he was always frustrated that he didn’t have anybody to tell it to.

Tooru Oikawa liked being the best at playing piano. He liked being a prodigy. He liked, more than anything in the world, that his playing piano could mean something to someone, could make them laugh and cry and want to keep listening.

So when the day came that he could no longer play, he wondered if maybe, just maybe, he had outstayed his welcome and god was ready to finally make him feel fire.

“Sometimes, I wonder if I made the right decision.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, maybe if I had dedicated myself to something other than piano. Like ballet, or singing, or volleyball, I could have been the best at that. I wonder if piano was the right decision.”

“Well that’s stupid.”

“What? Why?”

“Simple. Do you like to play piano?”

“Yes. I love it.”

“Did you love it when you first started?”

“Of course.”

“Did you love it for every hour that you practiced?”

“Yeah.”

“And you think you’ll always love it?”

“I suppose.”

“Then you made the right decision. You’re doing something you love.”

“But what if I love something else and I don’t know it?”

“That’s bullshit.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

“I’m definitely right.”

“Iwa-chan.”

“What? Why are you looking at me like that? You’re not gonna pass out again, are you?”

“No.”

“Then what?”

“I think I love you more than I love piano.”

 

* * *

 

For his debut solo concert—aside from the casual recitals and nights at bars throughout Japan—at a music hall in Tokyo, Tooru had played Mozart. His piano sonata in F major, fantasia in d minor (still one of his favorites, it haunted him), rondo in a minor, adagio in b minor. Later in his career Tooru was never known for his inspiring performances of Mozart, though they were inspiring. He was better known for his inspiring performances of Rachmaninoff and Debussy and Liszt. But as a young child, only sixteen, the crowd had been amazed. How talented, how effortless, Mozart was smiling down on them today.

Today, for his final concert, he didn’t play any Mozart.

His heart was suffocating as he sat backstage, listening to the throngs of people flooding into the concert hall. Deep breaths, he kept reminding himself. In and out. There was nobody backstage comforting him, so he sat down at a small table and pulled out his notebook—the same notebook he used before every concert. Each page was dated, and it was almost full. It was a nice pink notebook with a ribbon to mark his spot and precise binding. He pulled out a pen and he started to write.

_Dear Iwa-chan,_

_Today is my last concert. Every time I think that, I feel like I want to die. I’m being melodramatic again, I know. I just never thought that I would ever have a last concert—at least, not so young. I’m only twenty-four. I’ll be twenty-five in two months. But you already knew that. The point is, I thought I would be playing piano until I grew old and decrepit and people would only be able to recognize me through my music. You understand, right? How much music means to me? You’ve always understood. That, besides you, music is my everything. In a few minutes I’ll go onto the stage and I’ll play in front of people for the very last time. Some of them say that I’m the best pianist who’s ever lived, but that doesn’t matter now. I won’t have the chance to improve anymore, and soon enough, some young genius will surely surpass me. I’m not that talented. The beauty of my playing comes from my practice. But I suppose you knew that already, too._

_I’m sorry. I’m talking about myself again. That’s so like me._

_I think about you every moment of every day. I never stop. The memories of you, your smile in the darkness behind my eyes, it fuels my soul when I play. I want to play and conjure an image of you in front of me—though you never did like Rachmaninoff. It’s a shame. I miss you so much. One day I dream of playing for you again, watching you smile at me on the clouds. I’ll play you something jazzy, something upbeat, not the melodramatic stuff I always play for myself. Gershwin, maybe. You like Rhapsody in Blue, right? I like to play that one. I’ll play it for you._

_Good-bye, Iwa-chan. I love you. Maybe I’ll see you soon._

_Forever yours,_

_Tooru Oikawa._

Tooru closed his notebook, put it back into his bag, stood up and began to pace. His fingers were aching and their tips were red, raw, looked like the skin had been ripped clean off in some freak piano accident. When he blinked, though, the horrifying image was gone and his fingers looked just as pale and delicate as usual. He wiggled them so that they felt loose, and he started to hum the pieces he was going to play. He had no doubt, of course, that he was going to play them perfectly, because at this stage he didn’t know how to play any differently. Making a mistake meant that he was no longer who he was. Though it didn’t make much of a difference, considering it was his last concert. A twisted, dry smile distorted his face and he caught himself in the mirror. Disturbed, on edge, hollow in some places and too full in others.

When the time came, he went out to the shimmering black piano. He bowed. He sat down, lifted his curled fingers into the air, and let them come down onto the keys. His shoulders swayed, his foot pressed up and down smoothly on the pedal, and it somehow seemed as if the piano was moving with him. Or maybe he was the one moving with the piano.

After he was finished, he stood up and he bowed, and a smile once again crossed his features. A different smile this time. Gentle, graceful, charming, visual beauty to match the beauty of his music. The people gathered there to listen to him gave him a standing ovation and he could see their tears sparkling up at him. He wanted to reach out and crush every single one in his palm. But he didn’t—instead, he turned and walked off the stage for the last time. Moved straight for his bag, where the notebook was. He picked it up, held it in his tingling palms for a few moments, before he threw it at the wall as hard as he could and took nonsensical pleasure in the sound of its thud.

Tooru Oikawa was feeling loss. He was feeling the loss of the one thing left that he loved.

He’d used piano to fill the voids in his heart when he’d lost something more important, something that he loved even more. The only thing that he loved even more.

Tooru Oikawa was feeling loss, but it wasn’t even close to the loss that he had been feeling nonstop for the past six years, despite the constant and unrelenting music. The loss of Tooru’s piano was nothing compared to the greatest loss of his life.

When he’d lost Hajime Iwaizumi six years ago, it had destroyed him.

It didn’t seem fair, now, that the one thing that had helped him cope with that loss was abandoning him, too. He couldn’t play piano anymore and he wasn’t sure _what_ he could do, because playing piano had been his only way of both remembering and forgetting Hajime Iwaizumi.

_What am I supposed to do now?_

He had nothing. That was how he felt. That he had absolutely nothing, and it made him frustrated enough to want death.

“Where are you going?”

“Carnegie Hall. Isn’t that exciting?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it is. You’ve always dreamed of that place.”

“Every musician has always dreamed of that place.”

“What are you gonna play?”

“Rachmaninoff’s second and third piano concertos.”

“Are those the really hard ones?”

“For some, maybe. But not me.”

“Oh, bite me.”

“I wouldn’t dare leave a mark on that flawless skin of yours.”

“You’re so full of shit, you know that?”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.”

“Still. Carnegie Hall...that’s far.”

“Across the Pacific.”

“Really damn far.”

“Come on. It’s not like I haven’t traveled before.”

“That’s true, I guess.”

“Iwa-chan, don’t tell me...you’re gonna _miss_ me?”

“Shut up.”

“Oh my god, you are.”

“I told you to shut up!”

“How much? Tell me? Like, a little? Or a lot?”

“I’m gonna smack you.”

“You don’t have to be ashamed. I’m not ashamed. I’ll tell you right to your face that I’m going to miss you so very much.”

“Yeah, well, you’ve never been one for shame.”

“I resent that.”

“Just be careful over there in America, all right?”

“Yes, Mother.”

“I swear to god—”

“Hey, can I kiss you goodbye?”

“You...what?”

“Kiss you. Can I kiss you? I’ve been dying to.”

“Oh. Really?”

“Yes, really!”

“Why?”

“Why do you think? I love you.”

“You keep saying that.”

“I say it because I mean it.”

“I...”

“How many times do I have to tell you that I love you before you believe it?”

Silence.

“I love you, Hajime.”

“H-hey.”

“What?”

“Just kiss me already, would you?”

As it turned out, Tooru Oikawa hated Carnegie Hall.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

The day after his last concert, Tooru slept for almost 20 hours because he wasn’t sure what else he could do. At around five in the evening, when he rolled over in bed and couldn’t find it in himself to close his eyes again (he didn’t have any sleep left inside him), the sun was still up and seeping through his drawn curtains. A soft, haunting Yiruma melody was weaving through his ears and his pillow wasn’t stained with tears, the way he might have expected, but he could taste all of the tears he had been holding in sitting on his tongue like salt reserves. He reached his hand out to his nightstand, groped for a little bit, before he found his glasses and put them on. Then he grabbed his phone and checked for messages. There were about ten missed calls from his mother, a message from his sister, a few stray emails that he couldn’t be bothered to check. He covered his face with his forearm and tossed his phone to the end of his bed. Maybe he would get a cat to keep him company. Or a bird. Or a fish. He could name it something silly like Tuna-chan, even if it wasn’t a tuna, and rant to it about how much he missed piano.

He forced himself to stand up and take a shower, because he smelled like full concert halls and crusty dreams. He listened to Chopin while he showered, he hummed along, he ignored the achiness and the redness in his fingers, like snakes, in his chocolate hair. He was alone in a big house, and he felt the dull twists and turns of loneliness in his stomach. There was nobody that he could think of, nobody he wanted to talk to about this crumble of his life, except for the one person that he couldn’t talk to. The one person he could never run to again. Without really meaning to, he walked over to his record player and started playing whatever was in there. It just so happened to be Elvis Presley—he couldn’t remember why he’d put that in there. He got dressed, ignored the pings on his phone, and decided in the midst of imagining blue suede shoes that he was going to treat himself to dinner. In the city. He would take the train and go out to a nice restaurant, all alone, and order the most expensive appetizer, the most expensive entrée, the most expensive dessert. He would get drunk by himself on the most expensive bottle of wine there and, rosy-cheeked, he would come back home and stay up and drink more wine until he forgot that, tomorrow, he still wouldn’t be playing piano.

When he called the restaurant in Roppongi and told them he wanted to make a reservation for seven o’clock, they said that they were full.

“I’m sorry, sir. Tonight is very busy.”

“Please, it’s just for one. That’s simple, right?”

“I really am sorry, but—”

“It’s a reservation for Tooru Oikawa,” he interrupted. There was silence on the other line for a moment. “But I suppose if you _really_ don’t have any tables, I can go somewhere else for the evening.”

“W-well, actually, I think we can fit you in, Mr. Oikawa.”

He decided to put in his contact lenses instead of glasses. Then he gelled his hair, put on a very nice suit, sprayed some cologne that a friend had bought for him a few months back to celebrate his new status as highest paid pianist in the world, ironically enough, and walked to the Jiyuugaoka station. From there he bought his ticket, waited at the platform, signed a few stray autographs from the small aspiring pianists who recognized him, got on the train, listened to The Yellow River Piano Concerto. It was never anything he would dare to play, but he loved it and he never listened to his own recordings anyway. Once his stop at Roppongi station arrived, he left the train, and finally admitted to himself that he must have looked very strange, walking through Tokyo’s streets by himself in a suit and earphones. Tooru had grown used to being alone because music tended to keep him company.

He didn’t even bother looking at what the menu choices were—he stayed true to himself and ordered the most expensive of each course. And, when he looked back at the evening, he couldn’t even remember what food he ate. But it was good enough that he accompanied it with three glasses of wine and a goofy smile. By the time dessert arrived, he was significantly tipsy. He’d always been a lightweight and he knew it and he took advantage of it. He was laughing at himself a little bit, giggling at the thoughts in his head. The music he heard was, predictably, Elvis Presley. He hummed it out loud while he ate. Being alone and a bit drunk was a great situation for people-watching. He drew out a story for each person at this excessively extravagant restaurant and composed little melodies for them. He wondered if any of them recognized him over their golden cutlery and flickering jasmine candles, making a note to tell them to fuck off if they came over to him.

“I don’t play anymore, so don’t bother,” he would say, unapologetically. “Leave before I spit in your face.”

He imagined the scene playing out in his head and he laughed almost hard enough to choke on his tiramisu. His gaze continued around the room, occasionally catching the eye of someone, shamelessly taking in the details of strangers.   

One person, as it turned out, wasn’t a stranger.

Or a person, really.

Tooru felt his heart stop, felt his eyes sinking into the back of his head and his hands begin to shake, when he saw a ghost at the other end of the room. It had to be a ghost. A phantom. At the very least, a hallucination born of the alcohol that poisoned his senses. Or maybe it really was a person, a completely different person with an uncanny resemblance. He blinked to make sure that he really _was_ there.

It looked like—no, it must have been—Hajime Iwaizumi.

_But that’s not possible._

_It can’t be you._

He stared down at his plate for a few moments and felt his world spinning. Faster and faster until his vision blurred and his head ached and he had to squeeze his eyes shut. He called the nearest waiter over and asked for a double espresso. He downed it and looked back up, and still, the ghost was there. Hajime Iwaizumi was there.

He was dressed so nicely, in a suit, an elegant black bowtie, his sheen hair looked like it had been taken care of and his skin glowed even from all the way over there. Tooru watched every move like a hawk. And somehow, Hajime didn’t notice the piercing gaze on him. He was distracted by the person sitting across from him: a woman, in a glittering red dress and her black hair in a twisting chignon. Hajime was smiling, his thick lips curled up, and every few moments he would bear his teeth and there in that smile Tooru Oikawa saw galaxies and memories and a present that never happened. He could hear his own heart and was afraid that if he opened his mouth, it would spill out onto his plate. And he heard a song. The same song he had always heard around Hajime Iwaizumi.

_There’s no way._

_It must be the wine._

He ordered another double espresso and shook as if the temperatures were subzero.

Tooru stayed at the restaurant much longer than he’d been meaning to. The ghost of Hajime Iwaizumi had only just arrived, but Tooru couldn’t leave him. He couldn’t talk to him, either, and crouched his head, hoping that he wouldn’t notice him. Because, despite everything, he would surely still recognize him. After he had essentially sobered up and was afraid he would drift off to sleep, far past the last train out to the suburb where his home was, Hajime and the woman with him finally paid the bill and stood up to leave. She put her arm through his while they walked—Tooru lowered his face when they passed discreetly by his table. Then, once they were out of the door, he scrambled to his feet and followed.

There wasn’t really any purpose to following him. It was just something Tooru had to do. Now that he had seen this person, this ghost of someone who had once been the most important person in his life, he had to follow him. And still, as he walked strides behind them under the dark, starless early summer sky, he couldn’t find the courage to call out his name. To touch his arm, grab his hand the way he used to, smile and kiss his cheek and say, Iwa-chan, it’s me, don’t you remember? We loved each other once. All he had to do was reach his hand out, all he had to do was open his mouth and say the words. But he felt such a visceral, devastating fear that he could do nothing but walk and fall in love with the way his back looked when he walked. One hand in his pocket. Slightly slouched.

_How is it that you look exactly the same?_

The streets were crowded because, on a night like this, the city was bustling. It was mostly young people, hopping from bar to bar, theater to theater, the inside of a sophisticated restaurant to a dark alley in the corner to smoke a joint. Neon lights flashed and crosswalks pulsed but Tooru was blind to it all. He never once lost sight of the ghost in front of him. They walked for about twenty minutes, until the couple paused and turned to walk into one of the apartment buildings in a narrow, quaint residential area. Tooru watched Hajime put his lips to the woman’s cheek and she went up before him, unlocking the door and disappearing into the building. Hajime (the ghost of Hajime?) didn’t move. He watched the door for a few moments. So Tooru didn’t move, either.

And then, without warning, Hajime turned and was facing Tooru. He leaped forward, grabbed Tooru’s collar with one hand, and threw him against the nearest wall. The bricks dug into his back and he knew that his suit was ruined—his head stung from the blow, the breath left his shocked, open lips.

But he was there. Hajime was right there in front of him. And Tooru knew now that he couldn’t be a ghost because he could _feel_ his fingers on his collar, could see the livid expression on his face. The crinkle in his nose, the wrinkles in his forehead, the gritting of his teeth and the way his jaw tensed.

“Who are you and why the hell are you following us?” he hissed, voice low and angry. Tooru blinked and met his eyes. His mouth was open, but he couldn’t say anything. They stared for a few moments.

And then, it seemed to hit him.

Hajime’s expression of anger melted into one of surprise. His grip on Tooru’s collar loosened, his jaw dropped. He almost looked as if he had just been slapped in the face.

“Wait,” he mumbled, “Oikawa?”

Tooru reached up to touch Hajime’s wrist. He tried to smile, but his entire body, his mind, his very soul was trembling and he had no idea what his expression looked like. Maybe a child, learning how to introduce himself properly for the first time. Or a middle schooler, writing a valentine for his crush. More likely than not, though, he looked like a young man who was witnessing someone rising from the grave. So he probably looked more like Lazarus’ wife than anything.

“Iwa...” he breathed. The word was so short, hardly two syllables, and still his voice cracked like shattered glass.

He couldn’t remember the last time he had cried—he’d learned to curb the tears long ago. But at that moment, pushed up against the wall, in pain both physically and emotionally and not quite believing what he was seeing, he couldn’t help it. The tears flowed down his cheeks in a rush and his lips trembled so hard he was afraid he might accidentally bite them.

“It really is you,” he said.

“What are you talking about?” Hajime replied. His voice was still at a whisper.

Tooru couldn’t respond. Instead, he leaned forward, wrapped his arms around Hajime, and buried his face against the chilled skin of his neck.

And he sobbed.

In the middle of the street, he wept like an infant. Shaking as if an earthquake rumbled beneath his feet. He clawed at Hajime’s back, his hair, the back of his neck. Afraid that in a few moments Hajime really would become a ghost and he would be alone again.

“I can’t believe it. I can’t,” he sobbed. Hajime stood still, maybe too shocked to hug Tooru back.

He felt cold and like crying much harder when Hajime pushed him away and held him at arm’s length. His expression puzzled now, lips pouting and eyes narrowed.

“Oikawa, what the hell is wrong with you?” he hissed.

“I—”

“Who the fuck do you think you are? You disappear on me for six fucking years and then follow me home like a stalker? What’s your problem?” His voice was getting louder and he was getting angrier. “And then you act like it’s some sort of miracle? Did you lose your mind?”

“But I—”

“I don’t know what happened to you or why you suddenly decided that you didn’t want me in your life anymore, but if you think I’m just going to forgive you and we can pick up right where we left off, you’re more delusional than ever. Goodbye, Oikawa. Leave me alone.”

“I thought you were dead.”

Tooru had to say the words quickly, and then cover his mouth with both hands to suppress the sobs. Waves were hitting him and he felt like he was drowning.

Hajime gaped at him. Looked, again, as if he had been slapped across the face. Blinked once, twice, three times before he turned and faced Tooru properly.

“You _what?”_

“They told me—they told me while I was in New York,” he stumbled, “they told me that you died. All these years I thought...”

“You thought that I was dead?” Hajime’s voice was choppy. “You’re not serious.”

Tooru couldn’t respond.

“No, no, that’s not possible. You’re just messing with me, you fucking asshole, you’re just messing with me like you always did.”

Tooru shook his head and his legs lost the ability to withstand the weight of his body, so he crumpled down to the ground and continued to cry.

“I was so upset that I couldn’t go to the funeral. They told me that they buried you while I was in America. And when I tried to visit your grave I could never find it, I was always so confused, all these years I never once found your gravestone and I just thought it was because I didn’t deserve to see it and God was punishing me.”

“You can’t be serious. You’re just...you’re just playing a prank. It’s a joke. You’re trying to make an excuse for why you never came back to me.”

Tooru kept shaking his head, as if that would wake him up. Because there was no way this was real.

“I thought you were dead for so many years...when I saw you in that restaurant, I thought you were a ghost. I thought I had finally gone crazy, that losing you and losing piano finally made me crazy and I was seeing ghosts. But you’re here. You’re here. You’re alive, you’re here.”

When he lifted his face, Hajime had crouched down in front of him. His face wasn’t puzzled, wasn’t angry, wasn’t surprised.

His face was sad.

“You’re really not joking,” he murmured.

Tooru reached his hand out and brushed his fingertips against Hajime’s cheek. Music was exploding in his mind and making his body ache.

“You’re here. You’re...you’re here.”

“Yeah. I’m here.” Hajime’s lips turned up into a small, sad, heart-swallowing smile. “I’m here.”

He reached out and held Tooru like a mother might hold a child, let Tooru fall against his chest, took Tooru’s tears against his skin.

“I never left.” 


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

        In his strange, almost drunken stupor, Tooru let Hajime lead him. His thoughts were jumbled and incoherent, and his mind kept replaying memories. Every moment that he had thought to himself over the past six years that Hajime Iwaizumi was dead came back to haunt him—because they had never been true. What did he miss? When he glanced over at the person next to him, he was hit with another wave of astonishment, confusion, relief, and happiness that was so unexpected and so bright he couldn’t even feel happy. He didn’t really know who this person, this six-years-older Hajime Iwaizumi, really was. The Hajime that Tooru knew was still eighteen years old. Waiting for him to come back from New York.

        They walked back toward the apartment building where Tooru had seen him part from the woman in the red dress. His legs were trembling as he walked. Hajime led him up the stairs, opened the door, let Tooru walk in before him. There was something strange between them. They walked close, but not close enough that they touched, and they avoided each other’s eyes. For Tooru, Hajime was a ghost—and to Hajime, Tooru had no idea who he was. Someone very horrible, probably. He wanted to touch Hajime again. Just hold his arm, or his hand, anything that would help him be sure that this wasn’t a cruel dream. They walked up a few flights of stairs and then stopped in front of an apartment door. Hajime pulled out his keys and turned them in the lock. He opened it slowly. The lights were already on. Tooru, standing silently behind him, could smell him. His scent was still the same. How could that be? That after all these years the way he smelled was still exactly the same. Except for the slight, almost unnoticeable smell of cigarette smoke. Maybe he had taken up smoking. It had been six years, after all.

        And now in front of him was a ghost who wasn’t really a ghost.

        “Wait out here for a moment, all right?” Hajime said.

        “All right.”

        Hajime slipped into the apartment, leaving the door slightly open. Tooru, alone for a moment, wiped his running nose on the back of his sleeve (the suit was ruined anyway). The music in his mind, the tune he’d started hearing when he’d first seen Hajime, was becoming clearer. His thoughts were slowly, so slowly, coming into focus, and he recognized the tune now. Hajime’s voice floated out to him and he realized that he was speaking to the woman, already inside. He recognized the tune and was amazed at how well it still fit with Hajime’s voice, Hajime’s scent, Hajime’s name. It had always been Hajime’s song, at least in Tooru’s head.

 

* * *

 

        “Oikawa!”

        “Hmm?”

        “Over here.”

        “Oh, oh, sorry. What is it?”

        “Could you stop practicing for like _five_ minutes and come play tag or something? I’m bored. And all you do is practice.”

        “Uh, well...”

        “Come on. You can take five minutes, can’t you?”

        “S-sure. I guess.”

        Hajime grabbed Tooru’s hand (his fingertips were red) and pulled him from the piano bench. He dragged him outside, despite both of them being barefoot, and they ran around under the sun. Tooru allowed himself this moment and prayed, pleaded with whomever was shedding the sun down upon them, that his parents wouldn’t find out. When they were breathless and their knees were scraped and they were dizzy from laughter, they collapsed onto their backs and lay in the grass, shoulder-to-shoulder.

        “What does that cloud look like to you?” Hajime asked.

        “A half rest.”

        “A what?”

        “A little hat.”

        “Oh. Hey, yeah, it does.”

        Tooru stood up and walked back inside, and Hajime followed him. Stood, looking around the house that had become as familiar to him as his own, while Tooru took his seat back at the piano bench. His hands hovered over the black and white keys, but when he looked back at Hajime, he smiled and tapped the seat beside him. With a cheeky little smile, Hajime sat down.

        “Check this out, Iwa-chan.”

        Tooru reached up and grabbed his big binder. It was where he kept all his sheet music, separated by composer and musical era. He flipped the pages, flipped, flipped, until he got to the spot he wanted and took out two pieces of paper.

        “Whoa. Look at all those notes,” Hajime said. Tooru nodded and watched his wide eyes follow the sheet. “What is it?”

        “Rachmaninoff’s third concerto. It’s like one of the hardest pieces.”

        “Sweet.”

        “I’m gonna play it one day, better than anybody else.”

        “That’ll take a lot of practice.”

        “Sure it will. But I have time.” Tooru threw his arm around Hajime’s shoulders and started to sway. “Will you come watch me play it when I get it?”

        “’Course I will. What kind of stupid question is that?”

        Tooru laughed and put the sheet music back. He started swinging his legs—his toes just barely reached the pedal. Hajime started swinging his legs, too.

        “Oikawa. Play that one song, the American one.”

        “You want me to sing for you, Iwa-chan~?”

        “Stop it, dummy.”

        “I’ll play it just for you. But only if you sing with me.”

        “Deal.”

        He didn’t need the sheet music for this one—he had it memorized especially for moments like this, when Hajime requested to hear it. His hands hovered for a little bit longer, he stared at Hajime with teasing eyes, before he let his fingers flow. A chord. A jazzy little riff. A dramatic pause, where he could watch Hajime’s chest swell with his widening smile. Then he started to play again, swaying so that he bumped Hajime’s shoulder and forced him to sway, too. The sound of the piano flooded the house and it was the only thing they could hear. It was clear and pristine, because Tooru’s fingers were magic. And when the time came, he started to sing. He was young, and his voice was more high-pitched than the original, but he didn’t mind. Hajime didn’t mind, either.

        “It’s nine o’clock on a Saturday,” he sang, “regular crowd shuffles in.”

        “There’s an old man sitting next to me,” Hajime jumped in.

        “Making love to his tonic and gin.”

        Tooru’s parents hated it when he played songs like this.

        “You can’t perform that in concert halls, Tooru,” they said.

        But he learned them anyway so he could play them for Hajime. Together, they started to belt out in their young, thick accents the words that they had spent hours memorizing. It had taught them lots of English words. Crowd. Gin. Love.

        (They still weren’t sure what “stoned” meant, but they always still sang that part anyway.)

        “He says, son can you play me a memory? I’m not really sure how it goes. But it’s sad and it’s sweet, and I knew it complete, when I wore a younger man’s clothes.”

        “La, la la, la dee da,” Tooru sang. He was batting his eyelashes at Hajime, his fingers still pressing perfectly to the piano. Hajime was watching his hands. His face was bright red. He was still swinging his dirty little feet and Tooru loved that he could play piano because it meant he could make Hajime smile like that.

 

* * *

 

        _Sing us a song._

_You’re the piano man._

_Sing us a song tonight._

_Well we’re all in the mood for a melody._

_And you’ve got us feeling all right._  

 

* * *

   

        Hajime’s apartment smelled like stale coffee, burnt-out cigarettes, and fried tofu. It wasn’t a bad smell—at least, when Tooru walked into the apartment, his first thought wasn’t that Hajime’s apartment smelled bad. As he stepped inside, the woman in the red dress walked past him. There was a forced, awkward smile on her lips, and he tried to smile back but was sure that it hadn’t looked much like a smile. She waved her hand at Hajime and descended down the stairs. Tooru closed the door of the apartment, clumsily. The shakiness was obvious because he had never, not once in his life, been described as clumsy. After the door was shut, Tooru and Hajime were the only ones in the apartment.

        It wasn’t big, but it wasn’t small, either. It was right in the middle, with its unique smell and slight disarray. Papers everywhere, piles of clothes, downed beer bottles and cigarette butts. It didn’t look or smell dirty, just messy. One of the lights above the living room flickered. Hajime gestured for Tooru to come inside after he’d been standing at the door, still, for a few minutes. He stepped forward and felt as if he were walking into the past—but not his true past. A strange, distorted past that he couldn’t recognize. After all, he’d never been in this apartment before. He’d never seen Hajime in that suit, had never seen him as muscular, had never smelled the stains of cigarettes on him. So it didn’t quite feel like the past. But it certainly didn’t feel like the present.

        “Just, uh...make yourself comfortable, I guess,” Hajime grumbled. He was loosening his tie and meandering around the kitchen. Was he putting water in a kettle? No, that couldn’t be true. Hajime had never liked tea _or_ coffee. Tooru nodded, stepped out of his shoes, inched forward. It was then that he noticed a large German Shepherd asleep in the corner of the living room. Hajime hadn’t had a dog before, but he’d always wanted one. Tooru found himself glad that at least Hajime had accomplished that.

        After a few steps, Tooru found that he couldn’t move any further. Like his feet were stuck in mud, or quicksand, like there were chains around his ankles keeping him tied to the frightening present that told him Hajime Iwaizumi was dead. There weren’t tears flowing anymore (they must have dried out) but he shook as if he were still crying. He was vaguely aware of Hajime putting the kettle down, heaving a sigh—Iwa-chan your sigh hasn’t changed either—and walking over to him. Putting his hand on his shoulder, another hand on his arm. Leading him to the couch. Helping him sit down, telling him to lie down and get his shit together. No, Tooru thought with a dry smile, you were never very good at being comforting. It never bothered me.

        “I’m gonna make some tea. You like tea, right?”

        “Yes.”

        “What was that kind you always liked...?”

        Tooru knew that Hajime was pretending that he didn’t remember, because his nose wasn’t crinkling up the way it always did when he was really searching for memories.

        “Earl Grey. But anything will do.”

        “Oh. Right. Earl Grey.”

        Tooru managed, by some miracle, to unbutton his jacket so he could lie down on the couch. He closed his eyes because the flickering light was bothering him, and because his contact lenses were dry. He considered just taking them out—he had his glasses with him, but then he decided against it. The discomfort in his eyes was fresh and strange. He could hear Hajime more clearly with his eyes closed, fiddling in the kitchen with the mugs and the tea bags and the kettle starting to whistle. After an eternity spent making tea, he heard Hajime’s footsteps coming back to the living room, and he opened his eyes and turned to face him. He was bent over, expression stern, handing Tooru a red mug.

        “Come on. You have some explaining to do.”

        “I do, don’t I?”

        Tooru forced himself to sit up and grabbed the mug with both hands. His fingertips brushed Hajime’s and he felt that strange feeling again—the feeling of being in the past. It was Earl Grey tea. He could tell from the smell. Hajime, in his undone bowtie and dress shirt and slicked back hair, collapsed into one of the armchairs. He looked exhausted. After a few moments of staring into his mug silently, he put it down, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a packet of cigarettes. He popped one between his lips and lit it up old-fashioned, with a match. Tooru watched his chest swell as he breathed in, then watched it deflate as he breathed up toward the ceiling.

        “You smoke now,” Tooru said quietly. “You didn’t use to.”

        Hajime looked straight into Tooru’s eyes when he took another drag.

        “What, back when I was eighteen? No.”

        They fell back into silence. But, while Hajime looked away—at the ceiling, his pack of cigarettes, the mug on the table—Tooru stared unflinchingly at him. He didn’t want to look anywhere else.

        “So...” Hajime began. “I mean, you really thought...you really thought I was dead.”

        “Even I wouldn’t joke about something like this.”

        “For six years. It’s been six years.”

        “Yeah.”

        “That doesn’t make sense.”

        “Obviously not.”

        “Who told you that?”

        Tooru was afraid to talk about this. Explaining, admitting, thinking, would mean finally coming to the realization that the past six years of his life had been an utter lie.

        “Oikawa. Who the fuck told you that I was dead?”

        “I-I don’t remember.”

        “Don’t lie to me, you piece of shit. You don’t think I deserve to know the reason you left me alone here?”

        “I didn’t. I didn’t leave you alone. I would never.”

        “Yeah? Well that’s what I’ve believed for the past six years. The same way you believed that I was dead. Jesus Christ, it doesn’t even sound real.”

        “No, it doesn’t.”

        “So, tell me. I deserve to know. Who told you? What in fucking hell made you believe that I was dead?”

        Tooru took a deep breath.

        “My father told me.”

        Hajime blinked. Tooru blinked back. His lips were starting to tremble again as he remembered how it had happened.

 

* * *

       

        It was a phone call that he had taken while surrounded by echoes of Rachmaninoff’s third in the backstage labyrinths of Carnegie Hall.

        “Papa! I wish you could have been here, they loved me.”

        “I’m proud of you, Tooru. I really am. I’m sorry I couldn’t come.”

        “That’s all right. We’ll come back to New York together some other time.”

        “Sure, sure. Listen, Tooru. I have to tell you something. I wanted to wait until you came back, but I think it’s a better idea to tell you now. So you’re not caught off-guard.”

        “Oh. Uh, okay. You sound kind of serious.”

        “Sit down, Tooru.”

        “All right. I’m sitting.”

        “It’s about the Iwaizumi boy.”

        “Iwa-chan? What’s wrong? Is everything okay?”

        “Actually...no.”

        “Papa. What happened?”

 

* * *

 

        “He told me it was a car crash. Said that you were driving from Sendai to see family in Fukushima...said that your car flipped.”

        “A car crash,” Hajime repeated softly. He was staring at the ground, shaking his head. “I don’t even have family in Fukushima.”

        “That’s what I said. But he insisted. Said it was your cousin or something.”

        “Your father told you that I died in a car accident.”

        “Yeah. He said that you died instantly. You know, that you didn’t suffer or anything.”

        “How nice of him.”

        “I begged him to get me a ticket home as soon as possible, but he said that they’d already buried you. He said that you’d died a few days before the concert, but he didn’t tell me because he was worried it would distract me.”

        “Distract you?”

        “Yeah.”

        Tooru’s voice cracked, broke more with each syllable he said. He couldn’t stand the stunned, hurt look on Hajime’s face. There was no anger there—just confusion and pain. Tooru realized, looking at him, that maybe a person’s mannerisms, facial expressions, voice, didn’t change all that much as they grew older.

        “But...why?” Hajime hissed. He was speaking more to himself than Tooru at that point. Knuckles turning white around the handle of the mug.

        “I don’t know. I don’t know,” Tooru murmured. He stared at his reflection in the dark tea. He hated himself very much.

        “I don’t get it.”

        “Me neither. You must have called me, texted me, emailed me...but I never got anything. So I figured he must have been telling the truth. I had no reason to believe that you were alive and well and I didn’t know it.”

        “That part’s easy to explain. He could’ve blocked my number and my email address. It’s not hard to keep people from contacting one another.”

        “So my father tricked me. He went to such lengths to trick me into thinking that you were dead.”

        “I...guess so.”

        “Why would he do that? Why would Papa do that...?”

        The tears returned fresh, and Tooru tasted their saltiness on his lips. But he was paralyzed, unable to move even to wipe the tears away.

        Suddenly, Hajime stood up in a hurry, his fists clenched. Before Tooru could even react, he threw his empty mug across the room until it shattered against the wall. Startled, the dog in the corner lifted her head up and scrambled to her feet, and Tooru found that he could do nothing but stare at Hajime’s swollen, heaving body. The confusion and pain had been replaced by complete, unadulterated anger.

        “All these years I just thought you had finally gotten sick of me,” he cried, “but I was just lying to myself? When I sat awake at night wondering what the hell I did to drive you away...wondering what more I could have done to keep you here. I was just lying to myself all those years.”

        “You could never have driven me away, even if you had tried.”

        “I drove myself crazy over you and it was all for _fucking_ nothing.”

        “Me, too.”

        Tooru stood up. Still crying. Still shaking. He stepped forward and lifted his arms. Hajime stared at him. Drank him in, tears on the brims of his bloodshot eyes. And then he stepped forward, too, and he embraced Tooru. He held him tightly, so tightly that Tooru felt as if his body was being crushed—but he would willingly give Hajime every last breath inside of him.

        “I’m sorry,” they both said.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

        Tooru’s plane ticket was for seven o’clock in the morning. A layover in Shanghai, and then to New York City. Where he imagined there would be a crowd of people waiting for him to move their souls with his music, with the way he swayed on the piano bench and destroyed Rachmaninoff’s third concerto at only eighteen years old. Because he could play it better than Horowitz or Ashkenazy ever had. Rachmaninoff’s second concerto better than Zimerman, better than Lang Lang.

        “Just be careful over there in America, all right?”

        “Yes, Mother.”

        “I swear to god—”

        “Hey, can I kiss you goodbye?”

        He was in Hajime Iwaizumi’s bedroom, next to him on the bed, to say goodbye before his long journey to the States. No, it wasn’t the first time he’d travelled to perform, but Tooru and Hajime had made a habit of this. A tradition. Tooru felt that his late-night conversations with Hajime, the ones he would remember before he walked onto a stage, infused his fingers with the passion and grace they needed to bring the audience to tears. He had never told Hajime that he attributed at least some of his success to the way Hajime teased him, nudged him, called him nicknames like ‘Shittykawa.’ He would have to, one of these days, when he’d built enough courage.

        “You...what?”

        “Kiss you. Can I kiss you? I’ve been dying to.”

        “Oh. Really?”

        “Yes, really!”

        “Why?”

        “Why do you think? I love you.”

        “You keep saying that.”

        “I say it because I mean it.”

        “I...”

        “How many times do I have to tell you that I love you before you believe it?”

        It definitely wasn’t the first time Tooru had told Hajime that he loved him. He wasn’t sure how many times he’d said it—the same number of times Hajime had treated it as a twisted joke and ignored it. Maybe this time, Tooru mused. Maybe this time would be different and Hajime would believe him.

        “I love you, Hajime.”

        “H-hey.”

        “What?”

        “Just kiss me already, would you?”

        Hajime didn’t close his eyes. He stared, unflinchingly, ferociously with those eyes that cut Tooru’s very soul into little bite-sized pieces. Tooru blinked, wondered if Hajime could see how thick and black and curled his eyelashes were from this close. He leaned forward, nervous, afraid that Hajime would pull back with a laugh. But he didn’t. He stood his ground. So Tooru inched closer on the bed, until their fingertips just barely brushed. Closer. His heart hammered. Still closer, still nervous. What would he taste on Hajime’s lips? Tofu, probably. Iron. Vaseline that he always pressed onto his lips to keep them from getting chapped. (They were always chapped anyway.) Tooru licked his own lips. Whether it was in anticipation or anxiety he wasn’t sure. He inched just a little bit closer.

        Their lips touched and it hit Tooru that he was kissing Hajime Iwaizumi for the first time. He’d been desperate to do it, longing to do it, since he could remember. It didn’t feel the way he’d been expecting. It felt better. With just the simple kiss—they weren’t even holding hands—Tooru felt a key change, minor to major, and heard a thousand symphonies resounding together in the space, the width of a hair, between their tight lips. He kissed Hajime for as long as he could manage, digging his fingers into the sheets of the bed, squeezing his eyes shut. Until he thought he was going to start crying and he pulled away. Opened his eyes.

        Hajime had beat him to it. He had already started crying.

        Not crying, really. He wasn’t sniffling, his nose wasn’t running, no sobs. But there were tears on the edges of his eyes, his lips were parted gently, his fingers, too, were digging into the bed sheets. Tooru couldn’t help it—he tilted his head and he smiled. Hajime seemed surprised that out of every reaction, Tooru had chosen that one. He furrowed his brow, and that made Tooru’s smile wider. Without a word, he lifted his fingers, touched them to the corner of Hajime’s eye—like he was smoothing out the velvety petals of a rose. Those red fingertips became wet with Hajime’s tears. He sucked in a breath and his thin lips pressed tightly against each other. There was a word on his tongue trying desperately to escape, it seemed. Tooru wanted to know desperately what it was.

        “Why are you crying?” he asked, his voice at a murmur.

        “I’m not. I’m not crying.”

        “Yes you are. I can feel your tears. See? Right here on my fingers.”

        “I’m not crying.”

        “Oh. Well, okay.”

        “So? Are you satisfied now?”

        “No. Of course not,” Tooru laughed. He still would not take his fingers from Hajime’s cheek. Hajime didn’t ask him to.

        “You’re such a spoiled brat.”

        “Okay, fine, I’m a spoiled brat.”

        “I mean...what more could you possibly want, anyway?”

        Hajime was whispering now, too. And he was smiling. A shaky smile. Tooru’s smile was even more shaky.

        “I want you to kiss me this time,” he replied. Hajime leaned forward a bit.

        “And just why would I do that?”

        “Because I asked you to.”

        He leaned forward a bit more.

        “You’re so full of shit, Oikawa.”

        “Yeah. Enough that I’m in love with you.”

        “Just shut up.”  

        Hajime grabbed Tooru’s hand, the one hovering above his cheek, and he squeezed it so hard he might have broken Tooru’s bones. And while he squeezed, tightened his grasp, he pushed his lips to Tooru’s and let his desperation, his hunger, his silent and hidden affections, pour out onto the tip of Tooru’s tongue.

        Tooru hadn’t been expecting the kiss to be like that. It was everything that Tooru had been afraid to do himself. No caution left. No hesitation. A kiss that made his lips distort and ache and twist, a kiss that made his heart drop to the bottom of his stomach and his eyes squeeze shut. He could still feel his knuckles mashed in Hajime’s grip. He brought his other hand to the back of Hajime’s head so he could pull him even closer—and, when he felt Hajime’s tongue press against his tight lips, he parted them. He was dizzy, lightheaded, felt way too hot. If he had been standing up, he would have fallen. His knees would’ve buckled—he would’ve crumpled instantly.

        When Hajime snaked his tongue into Tooru’s trembling, slowly opening lips, he was taken aback. Hajime swept his tongue along his lower lip, his upper lip, down against his tongue and to the back of his throat, his hand squeezing harder with every passing moment. Tooru hadn’t been expecting this. Hadn’t been expecting Hajime to be so intense, so nimble, hadn’t been expecting his teeth to bite down on his lip or his bubblegum tongue to so easily swallow his breaths. Hadn’t been expecting him to be so experienced. Tooru heard himself moan out into Hajime’s mouth and was surprised, because he never knew he was even capable of making such a sound. But he couldn’t help it. All he could hear was Hajime, all he could feel was Hajime, all he could taste was Hajime.

        “I-Iwa,” he breathed when Hajime pulled away. Tooru’s lips felt swollen and he couldn’t catch his breath. He couldn’t help but follow, just to make sure that Hajime didn’t go too far. He liked that Hajime hadn’t stopped holding his hand. “I didn’t know you were so good at this.”

        “I feel like I should be insulted by that,” he smirked. Then Tooru felt the palm of his hand against his cheek—warm, clammy. His fingers stretched out into Tooru’s hair and pulled his forehead down, until it touched his. Tooru had never felt so close (physically or emotionally) to anybody. He must have been dreaming. This couldn’t be real.

        “It’s not an insult. I just wasn’t expecting it. You’re amazing.”

        “That is an insult.” He smiled as he said it. Tooru liked being this close to his smile. “Well you know what, I didn’t know you were so _bad_ at this.”

        “Hey! Mean! I’m plenty good at kissing.”

        “Yeah, yeah, tell yourself whatever you need to.”

        “Wait...am I doing something wrong? Am I not good? How do I fix it?”

        Hajime’s smile disappeared as he placed his other hand on Tooru’s other cheek. Shook his head. Pressed their foreheads together even harder.

        “Don’t change anything,” he murmured. Right against Tooru’s lips. “You’re perfect.”

        “Really?”

        “Yeah. You’re beautiful.”

        They were both crying now. Their tears indistinguishable.

        “But I don’t really know what I’m doing,” Tooru replied.

        “I don’t care.”

        Hajime kissed him again and his lips were salty now. Tooru realized that, maybe in hindsight, he should’ve know that Hajime would be this breathtaking, this experienced. He’d dated a lot over the course of he and Tooru’s friendship, especially in the past three years. He’d cycled through a lot of girlfriends. Tooru knew about just how experienced he was. And Tooru had had his own girlfriends (even a few secret boyfriends), but something had always kept him from going any further than a peck. A nervous, half-hearted touch of his lips to someone else’s. That something, obviously, had been his unshakeable love for Hajime Iwaizumi.

        “Oikawa. Lie down.”

        “Mm?”

        “Lie down. On your back.”

        Hajime cradled his head with one hand and shifted his other to the small of his back, as if he were easing him onto concrete ground instead of a bed. And then he followed. Kissed him, let their legs intertwine and their bodies press together. Tooru imagined that he was leaving an indent, the silhouette of his body, on Hajime’s bed. With each moment that passed, learning the shape of Hajime’s tongue as it spanned galaxies between his lips, feeling the tips of his fingers dissipate in his hair, Tooru slipped further and further into a strange unconsciousness. He was losing awareness of everything but the pleasure. The ways that Hajime could make his body writhe and twist with a touch to his neck, a bite on his lip, a moan against his teeth. Tooru didn’t have control over his own body anymore. Didn’t have control over the sounds he made, the things he saw, the way he felt. Hajime was in control of everything. He did manage to run his hands along Hajime’s back, feeling in more detail the indents and shape of his body.

        “I’m not feeling you enough,” he heard himself moan. So Hajime sat up, panting, and pulled his t-shirt up over his head. Threw it to the ground. Without once pulling his eyes away from Tooru’s. Then he bent down and kissed him again, his chest was warm, and Tooru pressed his palms into his back and hoped they felt like irons. At the same time, Hajime slid his hands under Tooru’s shirt and his body felt too warm and too cold all at once. He shivered, couldn’t help but arch his head back. His body was dancing to the melody of Hajime’s touch. He couldn’t keep the squeaky moans, the whimpers of pleasure, from spilling from his lips. Especially when Hajime started to kiss his arched neck—especially when he pressed his knee up between Tooru’s legs. He bent his knees and his back came up off the bed. Hajime breathed out against him while his fingernails drew pictures on his back.

        “Iwa—ah,” he sighed. Blinded by Hajime’s laugh vibrating against his neck. “You really— _mm_ —do know what you’re doing.”

        “You make it easy.” His lips were on Tooru’s chest now. Pressed his knee up again. Tooru thought about asking Hajime whether he was turned on by the moans, by the way his body curled, but he decided against it. He wasn’t quite brave enough yet.

        Instead, he said, “I love you, Hajime.”

        Hajime stopped what he was doing. He put his palms against the bed and held himself up, so that he was looking down into Tooru’s watering eyes. Now that he was looking, Tooru continued.

        “I’m in love with you.”

        “Oikawa.”

        “You know, you’ve never called me by my first name before,” he murmured. Hajime brushed the matted hair from Tooru’s forehead and smiled. Tooru wasn’t sure that he’d ever seen Hajime smile like that. Purely, gently, so happily.

        “Fine, spoiled brat,” he replied. “I love you, too, Tooru.”

        “Yeah?”

        “Yeah.”

        “Come to New York with me.”

        “You know I can’t do that.”

        “I know.”

        “I’ll be here when you get back.”

        “You promise?”

        “As long as you promise you’re actually coming back.”

        “Why wouldn’t I come back, silly?”

        “I just figured if I’m making a promise, you should make a promise, too.”

        “Okay—I promise I’ll come back.”

        “And I promise I’ll be here.”

        “And you’ll still love me?”

        “Only if you’ll still love me.”

        “Deal.”

 

* * *

 

        They broke their promises.  

 

* * *

 

        “It’s late. Why don’t you stay the night?”

        “No. I don’t want to intrude. I can just take an Uber or something.”

        “Stop it. You’re staying the night.”

        “Okay.” Tooru sipped from his now cold tea. “Thanks.”

        Hajime was cleaning things up in the kitchen, now dressed in gray sweatpants and a navy t-shirt. It must have been two, maybe three in the morning. Tooru was still dressed in the suit because he didn’t have anything else to wear, but he had decided when the discomfort became too distracting to take out his contact lenses and put on his glasses instead. Hajime’s dog, Gemini, had woken up from her nap, and was now pestering him in the kitchen. Tooru liked her smile. He hoped that she would like him.

        “Let me give you a spare t-shirt or something so you don’t have to sleep in the suit. Is it all right if I make you sleep on the couch?”

        “Yeah. That’s all right.”

        Hajime disappeared into his room for about a minute, and came out with a white-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts. While Tooru got changed, he turned his back and pretended to be busy in the kitchen. Filling Gemini’s food bowl, washing the dishes, it didn’t really matter what he was doing in the end. He ended up lighting another cigarette.

        “Iwa-chan,” Tooru called. His head came up. “Could you come closer? You’re so far.”

        “You’re still as needy as ever.”

        He said the words, but he came closer anyway. Sat down in the armchair across from Tooru on the couch. Gemini trotted over and hopped onto the couch. Tooru took the opportunity to pet her, apparently gently enough that she took a liking to him.

        “Tell me what you’re doing,” Tooru said.

        “What?”

        “I don’t know anything about your life. The last time we...I mean, the last time we talked, we hadn’t even graduated yet.”

        “Oh. Right. I guess you’re right.”

        “So?”

        “There’s a lot to catch up on.”

        This awkwardness. This tension. It had never existed in their relationship before.

        “Start by telling me what you do.”

        “Right. What I do.” Hajime took a deep breath. He kept avoiding eye contact. As if trying to hide the fact that he was relieved, elated, shocked to see Tooru again (a fact that Tooru was already fully aware of). “I’m a cop.”

        “A cop? Really?”

        “Well, a detective now. But yeah.”

        “That’s amazing, Iwa-chan.”        

        “It’s tough. It’s real tough. There’s a lot of fucked up shit that happens in this city.”

        “It happens everywhere, though.”

        “Yeah. That’s why I don’t feel so bad being here.”

        “What do you investigate? Murders, rapes...?”

        “Everything.”

        “That certainly explains the smoking.”

        Hajime smirked and took another drag. Eyes bloodshot, bags under his eyes large enough to carry the entire world. And still breathtakingly beautiful. A picture that Tooru had always fabricated in his mind but was now a reality.

        “You always did want to be a cop, though. You used to force me to play the bad guy so you could save the day. Remember?”

        “I remember,” he scoffed. “I guess we both got where we wanted to go.” He smiled, but it betrayed not even a hint of genuine happiness. That much Tooru could tell—that much hadn’t changed.

        “I don’t know about that.”

        “What are you talking about? People are saying you’re one of the best pianists who’s ever lived. And you never wanted to do anything except piano. As the pushover best friend you were always blowing off, I would know.”

        “That’s true. I do love it. And I was one of the best.”

        Hajime paused, mouth open, before he replied.

        “Was?”

        “I’m finished with piano.” Tooru let a smile light up his face, despite the fact that just saying the words made his heart crumble.

        “What?”

        “Last night was my final concert. The last curtain call.”

        “Right, I saw the ads for it. But...your last concert? I figured pianists could play for decades. You’ve barely been playing for two.”

        “I’ve had a good run, though. Not many get to say they were child prodigies. Making people cry since six years old.”

        “How are you still full of this much shit?” Hajime said, his voice a burst of cynical laughter.

        “What, am I wrong?”

        “No, unfortunately, you’re not.” He put out his cigarette. “So, what happened? Decided that you have enough money to last you the rest of your life? You don’t need piano anymore?”

        “You know better than anyone that I never played piano out of necessity,” Tooru said.

        “Yes you did.”

        “Necessity for _money_.”

        “Yeah. I know.” Hajime’s face became a colorful canvas of bright nostalgia, saturated memories, intense sadness. “You couldn’t even breathe without piano. Sometimes, when I asked you how you were doing, you’d say, ‘Horribly, Iwa-chan! I only played for two hours today.’”

        Tooru laughed. Hajime’s imitation of him was good. Accurate.

        “Why the last concert, then?” he asked.

        Tooru wasn’t sure if he was ready to talk about this with Hajime. If he was ready to give up one love as soon as the other returned to his life—to go through such a whirlwind of emotions. He would break if he did. He looked down at his long fingers, spread out in his lap, and he shrugged.

        “Sometimes talent isn’t enough.”

        “Don’t give me that bullshit. You were never just talented. You’re the hardest worker I know.”

        Maybe it was something small and insignificant, but Hajime’s use of the present tense in that sentence made Tooru dizzy and watery-eyed.

        “Sometimes things get in the way that we can’t control.”

        “So you just...stop trying?”

        “It’s not that simple.”

        “Seems simple enough to me.”

        “Then you don’t understand.”

        “Is Tooru Oikawa trying to tell me that I don’t understand him? That’s rich.” Hajime stood up, hands in his pockets, and walked back to the kitchen. Not to do anything, really. Just to pace.

        “It has been six years. I could be a completely different person, you know.”

        “But you’re not. You’re exactly the same. Just like me.”

        “That’s not true. You seem different to me.”

        “Oh yeah? How?”

        “You’re taller. You have more stubble on your face—and your hair is gelled. You never once gelled your hair for the 13 years that I knew you. And your voice is a bit gruffer. From the smoking, I think. You smile less—”

        “Come on, I’ve always been kind of an asshole.”

        “—I mean, even less than before. You carry yourself with something different. Maturity, I guess. Like you know what you’re doing.”

        “Does it really seem like that? Cuz I’m just as lost as ever.”

        “Yes, it does seem like that. Your eyes are duller, too. And...it’s harder to tell what you’re feeling.”

        Hajime paused and turned to face Tooru again.

        “Still. I haven’t really _changed_. A smoker voice and some five o’clock shadow don’t mean anything. I’m still the same. Right?”

        Tooru didn’t respond. He just stared, brow furrowed, into Hajime’s eyes.

        “And you’re still the same, too. Six years is nothing.”

        Tooru considered agreeing and saying that, yes, six years really was nothing, and that he still loved Hajime as desperately and as passionately as he did six years ago. That he had for every single fucking second since the day he thought Hajime had died.

        He didn’t say it, though.

        Not yet.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

        “What was that one song you used to play?”

        “I played a lot.”

        “No, no, I mean, you were obsessed with this one. You must have played it at least twice a day.”

        “I want to see if you remember it.”

        “Fucked if I know, the titles are all the same.”

        “That’s not true.”

        “Minor, major, random letters.”

        “Stop pretending that you don’t know anything about music.”

        “Okay, fine. I think it was in minor key.”

        “Wanna hear something interesting?”

        “Mhmm.”

        “I used to hate minor when I was younger. It made me too sad. I only played major.”

        “And then?”

        “I started to like minor more and more.”

        “This one was definitely in minor.”

        “It was probably Chopin or Rachmaninoff.”

        “That one. The second one. With the big hands.”

        “They both had big hands.”

        “Long name. Russian.”

        “Rachmaninoff. Do you remember anything about the piece?”

        “You had to use, like, the entire piano. And it’s really sad and dark at the beginning, and then, toward the middle, it gets kind of happy. Then at the end it gets fast.”

        “Kind of happy?”

        “Yeah. Like, floaty.”

        “ _Morceaux de fantasie_ , opus 3, number 1, elegy.”

        “Was I right? Is it in minor?”

        “E-flat minor.”

        “You used to play it all the time. I got so sick of it.”

        “Well, you never liked Rachmaninoff anyway.”

        “Why’d you like it so much?”

        “I don’t know. Maybe because it let me feel things I could never feel on my own.”

        “What does that mean?”

        “Rachmaninoff felt such sadness. He pulled the music from turmoil. I never felt that.”

        “You’re a horrible liar.”

        “Always have been.”

        It was the middle of the night. Tooru was on the couch, lying down with a quilted blanket that Hajime had dragged out from the closet over his body. With droopy eyelids, slurred, sleepy words, heavy limbs, he watched Hajime sitting on the armchair smoking his cigarette. Neither of them could sleep. So they were talking, and Tooru worked very hard to pick up the tones, melodies, harmonies in Hajime’s voice that had changed. He was trying to gauge who this person was, whether he really was the same. The lights were off, so he couldn’t see very well, but since his eyes had adjusted he had become aware of f Hajime’s silhouette on the chair. He wasn’t sure how long they’d been talking. About everything.

        He examined in excruciating detail the curve of Hajime’s arm when he stretched it over his head, his gaze turning up to the corner of the room in thought. The way his lips moved, not totally matching his words, when he spoke, asked questions, all directed at Tooru himself. The swell of Hajime’s chest when he breathed became as vivid, as colorful, as dramatic as a cinema screen and as loud as the percussion he used to hear on stage when he played concertos. Every few moments, he wiped the tears from the corners of his eyes with his raw, red fingertips, in the hopes that Hajime hadn’t seen them. When his eyes hurt, when his heart ached, from looking at Hajime in this intimate darkness, he buried his face in the crook of his arm. Gemini had decided, for some reason, that she liked Tooru, and elected to sleep on the couch with him. It made him much warmer but significantly restricted his movement.

        He could practically see Hajime’s voice erupting in bright colors when he spoke. The hues mixed and swirled into beautiful shades that Tooru didn’t know even existed, and they floated up to the ceiling, filled the air of the apartment until Tooru could feel it when he breathed in through his nose, out through his mouth. Repeat, in a desperate attempt to get every last bit of Hajime—why is he sitting so far away from me?—that he could. He knew it would be hard for him to sleep. It must have been the same for Hajime, because he was still awake. Sitting on the armchair. Speaking with Tooru in hushed tones the way they used to when they told each other their secrets when they were twelve, thirteen, fourteen years old.

        “What do you do in your free time?” Tooru heard himself ask.

        “What free time?”

        “Do you still go on runs?”

        “Yeah. Every morning at six, me and Gemini.”

        “That’s so early.”

        “You used to get up that early, too.”

        “To practice, not go for a run.”

        “I drink a lot.”

        “That doesn’t surprise me.”

        “You know that bar downtown? The Black Cat?”

        “Of course. When I was in middle school, the owner of the bar let me play on the weekdays. Remember?”

        “Yeah. I snuck in once, but when they found me they kicked me out.”

        “I was special.”

        “They just liked the way you played ‘Piano Man.’”

        “You did, too.”

        “But you were always a shit singer.”

        “You’re one to talk.”

        “How did the words go, again...?”

        “Iwa-chan! Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten the words to ‘Piano Man?’”

        “Sing the first few lines, maybe I’ll remember.”

        Tooru cleared his throat and put a hand to his chest to calm his racing heart—he hadn’t sung this song in six years. He’d put it out of his head, forced it from his mind and heart and soul, the day that Hajime died. But he still remembered the words.

        “It’s nine o’clock on a Saturday,” he sang, his voice raspy and breaking in its low tone. His cheek was pressed to the sofa, so his voice was a little muffled. “Regular crowd shuffles in.”

        At that, Hajime’s face lit up, and he opened his mouth.

        “There’s an old man sitting next to me, making love to his tonic and gin.”

        “There you go,” Tooru smiled. “You do remember.”

        “I guess I do. You still play it?”

        “No. Not once.”

        “I don’t blame you.”

        “I’m so happy to see you, Iwa-chan. And still, I feel so sad.”

        “Yeah? And why’s that?” He didn’t sound surprised to hear that Tooru was sad. Maybe he could tell that for every moment that they’d been together, Tooru had been desperately holding back tears.

        “Because I don’t know anything about your life anymore. I used to know everything about you. Where you were practically every second of every day. Now I don’t know anything.”

        “So,” Hajime began. He took a deep breath. Tooru watched his body hover, watched his chest swell, watched his lips pucker and purse as he let the breath empty from his expanding ribcage. How was it that he could do nothing but breathe, just breathe, and make Tooru feel as if the world were crashing on top of him in jagged, glassy pieces?

        “So...?” he repeated.

        “Just learn.”

        “Learn?”

        “Learn about my life. It’s okay if you don’t know it all right now. Learn about it.”

        Gemini opened her mouth and yawned, then placed her large head on Tooru’s shoulder. He liked the feeling of her there. She was a part of Hajime’s life that he had never known before, after all. He wanted to know her. He was weirdly jealous of her.

        “We weren’t born knowing about each other. It came when we spent time together.”

        “Do you know how much of a relief it is to hear you say that?” Tooru whispered.

        “What? Say what?”

        “That you want to keep me in your life.”

        “Don’t be an idiot. I never wanted you out of it.”

        “Do you want to learn about my life, too?”

        Hajime paused. Turned his face toward the ceiling, as if there were a message up there written just for him. He narrowed his eyes and even in the darkness, Tooru was enchanted.

        “Yeah. Yeah, I do. Who you hang out with nowadays. The types of places you go, the things that you do. What you eat. What you drink.”

        “The finest of wines.”

        “I bet you do,” he smirked. “I’m a bourbon guy, as it turns out.”

        “I’ll straighten you out.”

        Tooru didn’t feel such emptiness when he looked forward now. No, the music that had driven his life wouldn’t be there anymore—he wouldn’t be able to wake up in the morning knowing that there were people waiting to hear him play, waiting to watch him press his fingers to the piano. But he had something else to look forward to now. He had Hajime Iwaizumi to look forward to. A new, but not new at all, Hajime Iwaizumi that he had a whole new chance to learn about. Suddenly his mind was racing with the possibilities of the things they could do together, the things they could see together, the people they could meet together and the wine they could drink together.

        In the end, even if Tooru weren’t playing the music, people would be listening to his recordings for centuries. He would still inspire people after he was gone.

        Maybe it was good that he couldn’t spend all his time practicing anymore.

        He could spend it on relearning everything there was to relearn about Hajime Iwaizumi.

        “Well, there’s an easy place to start,” Tooru said. “What were you doing at the restaurant today?”

        “Oh. Uh.” Hajime paused, suddenly stiff and hesitant. It made Tooru listen that much more closely. “I was on a date.”

        “Yeah? Tell me about her. The woman. She’s beautiful,” Tooru replied. Hasty.

        “Her name’s Michiko.”

        “Pretty name. Your first date?”

        “Oh, no. I’d never take someone on a date that fancy for our first date,” he laughed.

        “Right. Silly me. Third date? Fourth date?”

        “We’ve been dating for a year and a half.”

        Tooru thought about his notebook, the one in which he’d written letters to Hajime practically every day since he’d been told of his death. He recalled himself, hunched over desks and rickety backstage desks, scribbling as desperately as he could the words he would never get to say to Hajime, while Hajime sat at a dinner table with Michiko. Bought gifts for Michiko. Held hands, kissed, fucked Michiko. It almost made him laugh. That he had been writing letters to a dead man while that same dead man had been living life with someone else.

        “What’s she like?” he croaked.

        “She’s...fiery. Ambitious. Knows what she wants, willing to do whatever it takes to get it. She’s like you in that way.”

        “Oh.”

        “She’s really smart. And she’s kind. She can be really feisty and she has a short-temper, which sometimes means that we fight a lot since I have a temper, too. But other times she’s really good at calming me down. And I’m good at calming her down. We don’t always mesh, but we mesh when we have to.”

        “What does she do?”

        “She’s an investigative journalist. I met her during one of my cases.”

        “Romantic.”

        “Yeah, sure. If you call sneaking into my office and pestering me for tips until I almost ripped my hair out romantic.”

        “She sounds amazing.”

        “Yeah. Yeah, she is.”

        “I’m happy for you, Iwa-chan. I’ll have to meet her. Give her my seal of approval.”

        “Yeah.”

        “Did you ever tell her about me?”

        Hajime stretched his arms up, the muscles tensing up, and then released the tension and slumped lower in the chair. Lips still slightly pursed.

        “No. I hated you. I thought you abandoned me. So I drove you out.”

        Tooru bit his tongue and stroked the top of Gemini’s head.

        “Right...”

        The silence was heavy now with shared, but diverging patterns of history. Inevitably intertwined and inevitably frayed. Threads that had once gone together really well, should have continued going together really well, but could hardly meet now.

        “How about you? Seeing anybody?”

        “No, not right now. Shocking as it is.”

        The truth was that he hadn’t been able to hold down a relationship longer than a few weeks for the past six years, but he found it hard to admit that to Hajime.

        “I was in a committed relationship with my piano, so...”

        “As usual,” Hajime laughed.

        Somehow, they started drifting off to sleep. Maybe from the warmth—the way that the conversation encased them and rubbed their shoulders and breathed against the back of their necks like lovers in bed. Maybe from the comfort, of having been separated for so long and now reuniting in an oddly poetic sleepover. Maybe from the sheer exhaustion. Tooru had never imagined that he would feel this many emotions at one time ever again. It left him drained, left Hajime drained, left his eyes drooping.

        “Take off your glasses before you fall asleep.”

        Tooru did as he was told, folding his glasses and putting them lightly on the table. Within the next ten minutes, he was asleep. And he was thinking of Michiko, her pretty red dress, and her fingers around his throat.

 

* * *

       

        Hajime dropped Tooru off at the train station the next day, but Tooru was hesitant to leave. He was afraid that if he did, Hajime would once again disappear from his life.

        His concerns were eased when, as the train pulled up to the platform and he turned to get on, Hajime grabbed his arm and pulled him back into an embrace. Tooru was a bit surprised—pleasantly surprised. He let himself be squeezed and he squeezed back.

        “When are you gonna come visit?” he asked.

        “When I can. I’m always busy, but...”

        “Not too busy for your best friend, though.”

        Hajime rolled his eyes, but was still smiling. The doors of the train opened.

        “You have my number. And you know where the precinct is,” Hajime called after him as he stepped onto the train.

        “If you miss me, listen to my recordings,” Tooru winked.

        “You’re so full of it!”

        He waved, the doors closed, and the train pulled out of the station.

 

* * *

 

        Tooru was thinking about Hajime’s girlfriend when he got back home, but he would have preferred much more to be thinking about Hajime’s dog. And he knew it wasn’t fair to feel this unbearable jealousy, this pettiness, and he knew that when—for it was inevitable now—he met Michiko he would have to be civil. If she had won Hajime Iwaizumi’s heart, he mused, she must have been very special.

        Back, alone in this large house, Tooru picked up his phone.

        “Hello?”

        “Hi, Mama.”

        His parents lived in Kyoto. With the millions of dollars that Tooru had earned, he’d bought for them a beautiful house in a very scenic area where they’d been living for the past three years. He tried to visit them, but it wasn’t often.

        He didn’t feel bad about it now.

        “Tooru! How are you feeling? Is everything okay? You wouldn’t answer my calls.”

        “I’m fine. Recovering from the last concert, I guess.”

        “Yes, of course, baby, of course. Rest up.”

        “Yeah. Hey, I wanted to ask you about something.”

        “Sure, sure. What’s up?”

        “I ran into somebody last night. Somebody I haven’t seen in a while.”

        “Oh?”

        “You probably remember him.”

        For the few moments that Tooru paused, his mother on the other end was silent. It wasn’t patient silence. It was nervous silence. He could tell.

        “I ran into Hajime Iwaizumi.”

        “Tooru—”

        “How could you and Papa do this? How?”

        “I...”

        “Why? You knew that I loved him. You knew that he was everything to me, how could you—?”

        “That was the problem.”

        “...What?”

        “We knew that you loved him. That was the problem.”

        “What are you talking about?”

        “I’m sorry, Tooru. You’ll have to talk to your father about it.”

        “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

        “I’m so sorry, baby.”

        “Don’t give me that!”

        “I told him not to. But he insisted.”

        “It literally ruined my life. You know that, don’t you? It ruined my life.”  

        “I know. I know it did.”

        “Then why did you let him do it?”

 

* * *

 

        She wouldn’t answer him. She insisted that he talk to his father.

        But the very thought of calling his father and speaking to him made Tooru feel physically ill.

        So he decided that he didn’t care about the reason, and that he never wanted to speak with his father ever again.  


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

Tooru couldn’t play very complex things, and he couldn’t play for very long, but he found rather quickly that it wasn’t too difficult to compose. He had only dabbled in composing before; he had never been able to take it seriously, devote a lot of time to it, because he’d always spent the majority of his days practicing. But he bought a special composition notebook, with special lined paper, that he used to work on his very first real composition. It was his last connection to the world of music into which he had poured his entire soul, his last connection to the world he had worked so hard to perfect. He knew so much about that world, after all. Could hear a piece and tell immediately what key it was in, what the time signature it was, categorize it or pronounce proudly that it had no category (such were the pieces that he so loved playing). So he let his mind start to work harder than his fingers, a new and challenging adventure—he had to think about which notes came next, and why, instead of just relying on the true and tried muscle memory in his fingers. He wrote, rewrote, rewrote again the first few bars of this piece. Going in, he had expected it to come naturally to him, but he was wrong. Which, in retrospect, wasn’t surprising in the slightest. Playing piano initially hadn’t come naturally to him, either. It was one of his strongest points: passion and hard-work. So he listened to a lot of music, even more than usual, and he watched YouTube videos about composing that made him feel like he was taking music theory classes again. In the corner of the large, open piano room of his house (he had an entire room dedicated to it), there grew a pile of crumpled up papers with abandoned black notes sketched in clumsy handwriting.

He wanted to compose something for Hajime.

Sometimes, when he sat on the piano and gently played the chords from the key he wanted to compose in, his fingers would start playing on their own. He would delve into a nocturne, a mazurka, a serenade that he hadn’t meant to play, and suddenly he would be filling his lonely, empty house with the sad music that he so longed to play in front of an audience again. Because, as everybody said, he could change lives with his music. People swore by his performances, his recordings, the ways that he moved their hearts. Old men who hadn’t cried in decades burst into tears when they heard his performances. In the middle of the piece, though, he would catch himself, and gently lift his hands from the desperate white and black keys. Lay them in his lap. Stare at the piano for a long, long time, until the horrible pit in his stomach subsided, and he picked up his perfectly sharpened pencil and continued sketching.

He talked to Hajime Iwaizumi a lot. They exchanged text messages regularly, though sometimes Tooru would go hours without a response—usually it was something along the lines of, “Sorry, had a brutal investigation today,” or, “The victim’s having a rough time of it,” or, “Just finished lunch, I’ll call you later.”

The dings on his phone were the highlights of Tooru’s day. They dragged him out of bed in the morning and reminded him to eat, drink water, shower, get out of bed and stretch his legs. Go out for walks, shave, make dentist appointments and haircut appointments and buy groceries. Just the knowledge that one of these days, when Hajime was finally free, he would come see him in these end-of-the-earth Tokyo suburbs, and Tooru could give him a tour of the house and play something for him on the piano. And in the midst of it all he would receive phone calls that made him blush like a child and walk around the big empty house in his pale bare feet, biting his lower lip and holding the phone as still as he could.

“How was your day?”

“Rough. I’m gonna start getting gray hairs.”

“That’s all right. I’m really good with hair. I can always dye it for you.”

“And you? How was your day?”

“Boring.”

“Get a dog or something.”

“Maybe I should apply for a job as a cashier.”

“Don’t make me laugh.”

“Maybe I could apply to be your assistant! How’s that sound?”

“I’d rather drive into the ocean.”

“Mean!”

And so they talked on and on and Tooru started learning about him again. He still loved agedashi tofu. He smoked too much. He had a penchant for hard liquor and jazz music (not really a surprise), he went on three-mile runs through the city every morning at six with Gemini. He liked being a policeman because he got to help people, and he got to put the bad guys in jail (that didn’t surprise Tooru, either—he always used to make him play the robber in cops and robbers). He and his partner got along well, even though Hajime’s temper was still as hot and dramatic as ever. He’d gotten very good at cooking, though he ordered in more than he would’ve liked to admit. He’d decided a few years ago that, someday, he wanted children. He went to the gym in his free time with his partner. He loved Michiko but he didn’t get to spend as much time with her as he wanted.

Tooru learned, too, that Michiko wasn’t actually Hajime’s girlfriend.

She was his fiancée.

“Proposed about a month ago. We’re planning for a winter wedding.”

“A winter wedding? Why the hell would you do that?”

“She likes snow.”

“That’s nice, I guess.”

“You’ll...come, won’t you?”

“Of course, Iwa-chan. Of course.”

It was good that they were talking on the phone, because Tooru wasn’t sure that he would have been able to hide the anguish on his face at that moment.

And, of course, he ignored all the phone calls from his mother.

He didn’t receive any from his father.  

 

* * *

 

Exactly a week after his reunion with Hajime Iwaizumi, after dinner, Tooru was at his piano, hitting the F key over and over and over again with his index finger. It was aching a bit. He was trying to find a way to use it, a way to follow it, precede it, work with it. Suddenly, in the midst of the flurry of F, the doorbell rang—the first two measures of ode to joy. As he stood up, slowly, languidly to answer the door, he heard the doorbell followed by earnest knocking. As if a hundred fists were banging on his door, urging him to quicken a step that wouldn’t be quickened. By the time he reached the door, he already knew who was behind it.

“Oikawa! Where the hell you been?”

It was the two people to whom Tooru had grown closest these past few years: his agent, Takahiro Hanamaki, and his manager, Issei Matsukawa. (It was, arguably, a similar job, but Tooru had found it much more efficient to have the two of them work together.) They were both around the same age as Tooru, and had been with him for the past three years. Takahiro Hanamaki was a stern-faced young man with beady, determined eyes, perceptively and constantly pouted lips, and a dark sense of humor. Issei Matsukawa, quickly fitting into the mold of Takahiro Hanamaki’s closest friend, was tall, dark, with black curls and intimidating caterpillar eyebrows and the ability to tell any joke with a face as cold as stone. And they were both capable, efficient individuals who excelled at giving Tooru advice and restraining him when his instinctive, illogical side threatened to get the best of him. They were also very good at teasing him, and very insistent upon it, and they made jokes naturally with fist bumps and high fives and finger guns. They found amusement in the overdramatic, flourishing antics of their client, and they didn’t shy from pointing it out.

The two of them, dressed in business casual, stood on his doorstep with their arms crossed and their brows furrowed. Takahiro spoke first.

“We’ve been calling your phone nonstop.”

“Why wouldn’t you answer us?” Issei continued.

“Asshole,” Takahiro finished.

“I...Sorry,” Tooru replied with an impish grin and a bat of his eyelashes.

“Listen, bud, we’re here to help. You’re going through a mid-life crisis. We get it,” Takahiro sighed.

“But we can’t help you if you don’t say anything,” Issei added.

“Mid-life crisis...? I’m only twenty-four.”

“So? You gonna let us in or not, Your Highness?”

Tooru, with an amused grin, opened the door more widely and stepped aside to welcome his guests. He bowed at the waist as they walked in, grinning, a little too proud to admit that they had decided to ignore him ignoring them. They strode into his home as if were their own (it might as well have been), Takahiro’s hands on his hips and Issei’s in his pockets. Tooru hadn’t seen them since the night of his last concert. It was a breath of fresh air after almost a full week of heavy, vast loneliness.

“It smells like broken dreams,” Issei said, taking a deep breath.

“And pasta,” Takahiro smirked.

“Shut up! I’ll have you know I’m doing just fine.” Tooru closed the door with a dramatic flourish of his hand, then stomped across the room. They watched him, lips puckered in amused, cynical smiles, until he reached the living room and invited them in.

“What do you want? Tea? Coffee? A cup of my tears?”

“At least you’re still a diva,” Takahiro said. They each clapped him on the shoulder as they took their seats on the ornate leather couches. “Coffee’s fine.”

He prepared the Nespresso machine in the kitchen, took only a few minutes, and returned to the living room with two cups of coffee. He sat down on his chaise and sighed.

“You gonna tell us what’s up or not?” Takahiro asked. Issei sat next to him, sipping his coffee, scrolling on his phone.

“Nothing’s up. I’m fine.”

“Hey, Matsukawa,” Takahiro began.

“What’s up?” he answered, without looking away from his phone screen.

“When was the last time King Oikawa over here didn’t respond to our messages?”

“My records indicate...never.”

They both lifted their eyes, staring at him blankly. He sighed again, but his lips turned up into smile and he put the heel of his hand against his forehead.

“You got me.”

“You gonna tell us, or should we pull out the torture tools?” Takahiro asked.

“I have the Top 40 playlist on standby.”

“Don’t you dare!” Tooru sat up hastily, pointing his finger at them. “Fine, fine, I’ll tell you.”

“We’re listening,” they said in unison. They had known each other for much too long.

Tooru explained to them what had happened with Hajime. They had both heard about Hajime before—they knew him as Tooru’s childhood best friend who had died in a tragic accident, but not as anything more. Tooru found that his mouth was running more than he meant it to; he told them about their reunion, about the conversation with his mother, about the daily conversations he had with Hajime on the phone, about Gemini and Michiko and the notebook he had that he no longer felt the need to write in. The imaginary Hajime to which the letters in the notebook were addressed no longer existed, after all. And, of course, he told them about the hole in his heart, gaping, black, as deep as infinity, left from the loss (or, maybe better worded, the end) of his lifelong dream of being the best pianist in the world.

“We were actually talking about that,” Issei interjected. “You’re too pretty to step out of the spotlight just yet.”

“What a compliment from you, Mattsun.”

“What if you, like, went into modeling?”

“Modeling? You must be joking,” Tooru laughed, tossing his head back.

“You’d make a lot of money,” Takahiro said.

“How droll.”

“Fine, how about...I don’t know, dog food commercials? Then you could break into acting,” Takahiro suggested. “You’re dramatic as it is, might as well put it to good use.”

“I resent that. Besides, my drama is _genuine_. I’m not an actor.”

“Not with that attitude, you’re not.”

“My point is that I’m a musician. Not a model, not an actor, nothing else. A musician.”

Tooru made sure that his tone was serious. He meant what he said—Issei and Takahiro must have understood. They looked at each other, shrugged, leaned back against the couch.

“We know,” they said.

“I’ve started composing, though! The world of music can’t kick me out quite yet.”

“Are you sure you’re up to...?”

Takahiro’s voice trailed off, in the middle of his sentence, when Tooru glared at him. Not a menacing, narrow-eyed, angry glare. A calm, one-eyebrow-up, coy crooked grin glare. The glare that they had become accustomed to, the glare that shut them up.

“Something to say, Makki?”

He sighed and turned away.

“No.”

“Hey, I have an idea,” Issei interrupted, slicing through the tension. “Why don’t we save the big future talk for another time. Let’s go out for drinks.”

“On you?” Tooru grinned.

“Yes, because as we all know, you can’t afford it,” he said. Stone-faced.

“I know a place we could go.”

“All right. Off we go! To Tokyo!”

“Speaking of, Oikawa, when are you gonna get a damn car?”

“When you let me pluck your eyebrows.”

“Touché.”  

 

* * *

 

The Uber dropped them off right in front of the Black Cat, its classy sign curling above the doorway next to the emblematic black cat. Tooru gave the Uber driver a generous tip, and the three of them walked confidently and rather elegantly into the bar. There was a _ding_ from the bell above the door. It wasn’t super crowded yet, because the night was early, but the people were there. From all walks of life, dressed to the nines or in casual sweatpants, speaking in hushed tones in the lush booths and tables and shimmering bar. The lighting was dark, with warm purples and blues to shed soothing dotted brightness, and there were jazzy tunes playing. Tooru felt warmth rushing into him—it had been so long since he’d been here, and it was different. Not so bright, or loud, or rambunctious anymore. It was dramatic, calm, classy, filled to the brim with the types of people that Tooru would have spoken to at cocktail parties. A beautiful waiter with blond hair and glasses was getting people their drinks. A tall, black-haired bartender with a smile that could make anyone buckle was mixing drinks with the fingers of a tried and true expert in flavor. When Issei, Takahiro, and Tooru walked in, he lifted his eyes, one hidden behind thick black strands of hair, and grinned.

“Welcome to the Black Cat,” he called, his voice like honey. In the dim light, Tooru caught the glimmer of the piercing in his eyebrow. “Have a seat wherever you’d like.”

Without even needing to discuss it, the three of them walked up to a few empty seats at the bar. They sat down, Tooru leaning his head on his hand and staring charmingly at the bartender.

“Haven’t seen you three around before,” he grinned. He’d finished the drink he was mixing, and handed it to a woman sitting at the bar with a wink. She thanked him, slid him a few dollars, then turned to the woman sitting next to her. They spoke in hushed tones, as if telling secrets they wanted everybody else to wonder about.

“I came a lot when I was younger, though I haven’t been back in a while,” Tooru replied.

“Yeah?”

“It was way different before, though. New management, I suppose.”

“That would be me,” the bartender said.

“No kidding. You own the place?”

“As serious as they come. Name’s Kuroo.”

“What a fitting name. Just call me Oikawa.”

Kuroo chuckled, sensual and definitely aware of it.

“What can I get you three fine gentlemen?”

“Best beer you’ve got on tap for us,” Takahiro said, gesturing to himself and Issei.

“And you, pretty boy?”

“Straight martini. Dry. Lemon twist.”

“You got it.”

He filled two mugs with beer, then started to mix the martini.

“What made you decide to buy the bar?” he asked.

“Family business. My old man used to own the place.”

“Ah. So you spent a lot of time here as a kid.”

“In a way,” he said with a shrug.

He poured the martini into a glass, garnished it with the lemon twist, and handed it to Tooru. Then, as Tooru took his first sip, Kuroo narrowed his eyes.

“I feel like I’ve seen you before.”

“Kid over here’s a famous pianist,” Issei grinned.

“You don’t say.”

“I _used_ to be. Not anymore,” Tooru admitted.

“I don’t...oh! I remember.” Kuroo snapped his fingers and leaned back, cleaning an empty cup. “You used to play here. Yeah?”

“A long time ago. Middle school. That’s...wow, over ten years now.”

“Yeah. Dad let you play piano. Damn, you were fucking good, too.” He shook his head, eyes lost in a nostalgic glint. “That explains the famous pianist thing.”

Tooru glanced over to the other side of the bar. There, at the very end of the room, was a small, dark stage, with a single lonely microphone and a black grand piano. Hidden in the shadows, as no piano ever should have been. His fingers itched and ached and turned blood red. He sipped his drink quietly.  

 “Hey. Why don’t you go play something?” Kuroo suggested, his voice dragging Tooru from his daydreams.

“What? Now?”

“Yeah. We’ve got the piano. Could liven things up a bit—haven’t had a live performer in a while.”

He looked anxiously at Issei and Takahiro. They looked at him, shrugged, do-whatever-you-want expressions on their faces. He wouldn’t be able to play for very long though, and never as well as he used to, but now that the suggestion was there he couldn’t deny the magnetic pull he felt against his chest from the stage.

“I think you should.”

This voice was unfamiliar. Tooru lifted his eyes and saw a shorter boy, maybe a little younger than Tooru, standing next to Kuroo. He had a bottle of Coke in his hands, his blond-with-black-roots hair tied up into a bun, wearing jean shorts and a graphic t-shirt. He was smiling timidly, softly.

“Even Kenma wants to hear you play. Go on! You might get some tips,” Kuroo winked.

“Well...all right.”

He finished his martini, stood up, and walked toward the stage. Issei and Takahiro hollered after him. At that, everybody in the bar became silent, watching Tooru make his way onto the stage. Kuroo, from behind the bar, turned on the spotlight. Of course, Tooru didn’t feel nervous. This was natural for him. He turned to those at the bar, gave a slight bow at the waist, flipped his non-existent coattail, and sat down. He figured he would start simple. Maybe take requests.

His fingers naturally started to play Thelonious Monk (he knew his audience). ‘Round Midnight, one of his favorites to play. He hadn’t gotten to play jazz in a while, and his body missed it and moved to it and his fingers were like agile, nimble little dancers. As he played, he looked out into the crowd. All eyes on him. Smiles, looks of awe, people swaying to the music. He delved deep into his music, closed his eyes and moved with it, let himself just _play_. It was what he was best at, after all.

When the piece was finished, he heard snaps, whistles. He bowed his head.

Then he heard someone call from the audience,

“Sing us a song!”

_Well,_ he thought to himself, _I_ am _the piano man, aren’t I?_


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

After his first night at the Black Cat, Tooru asked Kuroo, the charming black-haired bartender with the sexy smile and sparkling eyes, if he could come by and play. Kuroo said that he could, of course, whenever he wanted—the piano was there for him to use, and he could keep any tips that he garnered. The only condition Tooru had was that Kuroo not tell the audience who he was. Otherwise he would be flooded with questions, voices of praise, that would serve only to remind him that for the rest of his life he was condemned (though he wasn’t sure that was the right word) to play in clubs and bars where nobody recognized him instead of the large, famous concert halls that put his name up in lights. No more concertos, no more sonatas, no more orchestras behind him, playing to the tune of his fingers. Only pianos in bars that sounded like carnivals and microphones that smelled like beer. A voice not trained to sing making tipsy patrons clink their glasses harder, fingers playing a genre he wasn’t used to, jazzy tunes that caused toes to tap and tongues to click.

He convinced himself that he would get used to it one of these days.

“At least it’s piano,” he said to himself.

Even so, he imagined Rachmaninoff frowning a little bit when he played Billy Joel instead of his piano concerto.

 

* * *

It had been two weeks since Tooru and Hajime’s serendipitous reunion. He was at his piano again, playing little motifs, scribbling them onto his blank music sheets with a pencil that had grown dull from its uses. The pile of scrap paper in the corner of the grand piano room was steadily growing, and as it did, the emptiness of the rest of the house—meant for people to sit and listen—became more and more pervasive. He was humming to himself, trying to fit the pieces together, and coming up flat because he just wasn’t sure what he wanted the story of this piece to look like. Because that’s how he saw pieces of truly good music, truly good art. They were stories. Composers were telling stories with the music they wrote, and each note was a significant part of that story. The story would be incomplete without every half-rest, dotted eighth note, _crescendo_ or _decrescendo_.

Tooru still wasn’t even sure if he wanted it to be major or minor. He had always like minor a little bit more, maybe because it made him feel more emotions, but maybe the story he wanted to tell was major. He just didn’t know yet.  

As he sat at the piano, his head leaning against the shimmering black music stand and his fingers tinkering on the keys, aching, he heard the _ding_ on his phone. His hand reached up for it at the speed of light, and when he saw that the message was from Hajime, he let out the breath he’d been holding. He found that even though Hajime messaged him without fail every single day, Tooru was still deathly afraid that one day he just wouldn’t, and they would fall back into the spiral of losing each other to nothing all over again. It was the standard message. How was your day? Sorry, been busy. He smiled at his phone, blushing and horribly sad, in absolute angst, because he could imagine Hajime sending this message while Michiko fed Gemini in the kitchen. It was always the same. His heart soared at the thought of Hajime and, in the same breath, was thrown down to hell at the thought of how much he loved that woman. Enough to marry her come December. A little over six months away.

He responded to the message.

No need to apologize, I know you’re busy saving the world.

The next response was one that Tooru had always been hoping for, but hadn’t quite been expecting.

I might have time to come by this weekend. So we can catch up properly. That okay?

He jumped up from the piano bench, holding his phone in both hands. The smile spread across his lips before he could stop it, even though he had nobody to show it to, and he felt the flutters in his stomach carrying him up toward the ceiling. Fingers shaking (shaking and red), he texted Hajime back.

Of course! I’ll put on a special concert just for you.

Looking forward to it. Saturday night okay?

Tooru, knowing he would be free, opened up the calendar on his phone, just to make sure that Issei and Takahiro hadn’t scheduled him to go to any event. And, as he checked the date, he realized that Saturday was special. It was June 10th.

It was Hajime’s birthday.

Tooru texted back with a simple

Saturday night sounds perfect.

But he would have to do something special for Hajime. Would have to get him a present, to remind him that he still thought about his birthday, still remembered it.

He had six letters in his notebook addressed to Hajime on his birthday. For the past six years, every day on Hajime’s birthday, Tooru had sat down and written him a happy birthday letter, pouring out his soul—he had written him a lot of letters in those six years, but the ones for Hajime’s birthday had always been a bit more special. This year, of course, it would be even more special. For the first time in six years, Tooru could actually wish Hajime a happy birthday in person, while looking into his eyes.

 

* * *

 

_Dear Iwa-chan,_

_It’s the first time in so long that we’re not celebrating your birthday together. I woke up this morning and the first thing I thought to do was call you, and then I remembered that you wouldn’t answer. So I stayed in bed and I cried instead. Then I got up and I played ‘Happy Birthday’ on my piano maybe 100 times._

 

* * *

 

_Dear Iwa-chan,_

_Don’t worry, I still remember your birthday. I’ll sing it for you, just in case you can hear me up there. I don’t want you to think that I forgot._

 

* * *

 

_Dear Iwa-chan,_

_Happy birthday. I miss you so much. You’d be twenty-one today._

 

* * *

 

_Dear Iwa-chan,_

_It’s your birthday. Happy birthday. I bought a cake today and I’m going to eat it all by myself. Actually, would you be okay if I gave a piece to Makki and Mattsun? I think you would like them._

 

* * *

 

_Dear Iwa-chan,_

_You’re such an old man now! Happy birthday. I’m singing for you._

 

* * *

 

_Dear Iwa-chan,_

_You didn’t think that I would forget your birthday, even now, right? I never would. And I never will._

 

* * *

 

On Saturday, June 10, for the first time in 6 years, Tooru wouldn’t have to write a letter in his notebook to hang onto the thread, the hope, the damaging and terribly hot love connecting him to Hajime. He wouldn’t need to.

But he would need to get a present, a good one, and that fear once again stowed away in Tooru’s heart—that he didn’t know Hajime anymore. If he didn’t know him, then he wouldn’t know what present to get him, a task that had once been so easy for him. He had never once faltered in what to get Hajime for his birthday, had been notoriously gifted at gift-giving, but he found himself lost on this particular occasion. Of course, he had his hunches. The things he thought maybe, _maybe_ , if Hajime hadn’t really changed, he’d like.

Still on his phone, he pulled up the hours of the Criminal Investigation Bureau in the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department. In previous conversations Hajime had mentioned the people who worked with him, his police unit and partners, and he figured that they were closest to him. They might know the best thing to get Hajime for his birthday.

And Tooru would have rather died than contact Michiko for advice.

He had an idea of what he wanted to get for Hajime. Knew where to find it—knew the frills to add to it.

But he wanted to make sure anyway.

The next morning, Tooru put on a slim pair of capri jeans, a white t-shirt, sunglasses perched upon the graceful chocolate waves of his hair, and white laced shoes. He went to the Jiyuugaoka station and rode the Tokyu-Toyoko line, then the Hibiya line, into central Tokyo. On the ride he listened to Madonna and Michael Jackson. He kept his sunglasses on, even in the train, because he didn’t want to sign any autographs. When he got off the train at Kasumigaseki station, the soles of his feet flattening and soaring against the platform, he felt strange. Independent and beautiful, walking confidently with nowhere that he had to be, confident in the fact that he loved someone enough to ride half an hour on the train. There was a lightness in his chest and a grace in his movements, even though he wasn’t taking a seat at a piano or bowing after a revolutionary set—those were the moments that he was usually the most graceful. Yet here he was, doing nothing but walk down the street with his sunglasses on and his toes following his heels, and he felt as graceful as Aphrodite herself.

His nerves acted up a little bit when he found himself standing in front of the precinct, though. He knew that Hajime wouldn’t be there. He was in the middle of an investigation, meaning he was out on the streets. Tooru would nonetheless be interrupting a busy day—of that he was certain. But he figured this was better than calling directly, and if they really were busy, he would just ask for a number and contact them later. But this was important to him. So he pushed his sunglasses up to his head, closed his eyes for a moment, took a deep breath, then put on his most charming smile and walked into the building.

He asked the first person he saw for the Criminal Investigation Bureau.

“Are you here to report something?” the secretary asked.

“No, no, nothing like that. I just need to talk to one of the detectives.”

“Who?”

“Iwaizumi?”

“Oh, Iwaizumi-keiji. He’s with Special Investigations.”

And so he was directed to the offices of the Special Investigations team. While his heart pumped with pride that Hajime Iwaizumi, his very best friend, had worked his way with blood and sweat and training all the way up to the Special Investigations unit.

He pushed through a pair of glass doors, labeled ‘Special Investigations,’ and was met almost instantly with the smell of stale coffee, sweat, anxiety, old food, and insomnia. There were about six desks, all covered in paper and old telephones, and there were lockers and civilians talking to police detectives and officers and Tooru was overwhelmed. He stood anxiously at the entrance for a few moments, taking it all in, looking horribly out of place. At the desk closest to him was a detective, probably around Tooru’s age, leaning on his elbows and playing with a pen. His eyes were wide and bloodshot, though he looked like he hadn’t slept (or showered) in years. He had spiked up red hair, pale skin, an unnerving look in his eyes. It took him a few moments to notice Tooru standing there, hip cocked.

“Oh. You here to report a crime or something? C’mere, sit down and tell me about it,” he said, tapping his desk incessantly.

“No, actually, that’s not why I’m here,” Tooru replied. He took a step forward. Perhaps this was the talented and intense partner Hajime had been raving to him about—though he didn’t quite match Hajime’s descriptions.

“No? Then why’re you here?” The man wouldn’t stop playing with his pen.

“Well, I’m actually here about one of your detectives.”

“Fuck, he screwed up again, didn’t he? What, violent outburst? Unnecessary aggression?” the detective said with a roll of his eyes. “ _KYOTANI!_ Get out here.”

A young man poked his head around the corner, with dyed blonde hair cropped short and angry, dark eyes. Still, something about him reminded Tooru of a little puppy.

“What? What do you want? I’m busy!”

“No, it’s not about him,” Tooru sighed. The detective raised his eyebrows.

“Not that either, huh? All right, Kyotani, you’re free to go.”

“Fuck you.”

The younger officer disappeared again.

“All right, I’m listening.” The detective turned back to Tooru. “Who’re you here about?”

“Iwaizumi. Do you know him?”

“Sure, I know him. He’s not in. We have a brutal rape case that he’s working on—want me to leave a message?”

“No,” Tooru said for what felt like the millionth time. His charm didn’t seem to affect this red-haired detective very much. “I have a favor to ask.”

“A favor? About Iwaizumi?”

“Yes. You see, I’m a good friend of Iwa-chan’s, and—”

“Iwa-chan?!” The detective burst into hysterical laughter, slamming his palm repeatedly down against the metal desk. Tooru pursed his lips, raised an eyebrow, waited for the laughter to subside. “That’s funny, that’s fucking hilarious! You know what, I’m gonna start calling him that. Fucking _Iwa-chan_.”

“Anyway,” Tooru interrupted, “I have a strange favor to ask.”

“If it’s about Iwa-chan, you’ll wanna talk to his partner.”

“Oh. You’re not his partner?”

“Me? Nah, I’m too much of a nitwit. His partner’s in an interrogation right now, but he should be out soon—why don’t you take a seat at my desk and wait. He’ll be out in a jiffy.”

“All right, uh...?”

“Just call me Tendou.”

“All right, Tendou-keiji.” Tooru gave his knee-buckling smile and sat down across from Detective Tendou.

“Aw, I don’t get a cute nickname?”

“Would you like one? Ten-chan?”

“I change my mind, stick with Tendou.”

Tooru sat at strange Detective Tendou’s desk for a few minutes, staring very hard at the pen he kept tinkering with, but was harshly pulled back to reality when Tendou sat up very straight and called out someone’s name across the room.

“Yo! Wakatoshi-kun! Come over here a second.”

Tooru looked up, following Detective Tendou’s voice.   

He found himself drawn to the tall, muscular, chiseled figure walking from the interrogation room, a hard and unforgiving expression on his dark face. Wearing a white shirt, perfectly fitted black slacks, a mauve tie. Hajime really hadn’t been lying—he was undeniably and excruciatingly sexy. He had presence. The air around him seemed as if it was moving to make room for him, and he didn’t even notice. His hair was brown, hazel, almost green, his eyes narrow and piercing and hidden under thick eyebrows and when Tooru looked at him the only way he could think to describe him was terrifyingly beautiful. He was frightening. He didn’t smile when he heard Detective Tendou call his name, though he responded, walked over. Tooru stood up, gazed at him, his smile shaky. Hajime’s partner was looking right back at him. Looking straight into his eyes.

“Yes, can I help you?” His voice was deep and made the earth shake.

“You’re...Iwa-chan’s partner?” Tooru heard himself say.

“Iwa-chan? You don’t mean Iwaizumi.”

“Yes, of course,” Tooru said, finally snapping back into place. He smiled and batted his eyelashes. “It’s my nickname for him. I’ve known him a very long time.”

“Oh. Nice to meet you. My name is Wakatoshi Ushijima. And you are?”

He reached his hand out. Tooru shook it, rattled.

“Oikawa. Tooru Oikawa.”

Wakatoshi, upon hearing Tooru introduce himself, paused, his fingers still gripping Tooru’s hand like a python. Tooru noticed the slightest twitch in his eyebrows, a twist at the corners of his hard-line mouth.

“Tooru Oikawa,” he repeated.

“Yes, that’s right.”

Wakatoshi straightened up, finally letting go of Tooru’s hand. It felt cold in the sudden absence.

“You’re the best pianist in the world,” he said. Very matter-of-factly. It was so sudden, so smooth, that Tooru was taken aback. He blinked up at Wakatoshi (though, truly, he was only a few inches taller than Tooru was), for a moment unsure of how to respond. Finally, though, he smiled again, lips pursed.

“I’m honored you think so, Ushijima-keiji.”

“Dude’s obsessed with his...who? Schubert?” Detective Tendou interrupted.

“Chopin,” Wakatoshi corrected. “Your performance of his first piano concerto is sublime. Unsurpassable. Truly.”

“Well, Chopin made that easy,” Tooru grinned. He found it difficult to talk about this, but easy to hide.

“I’ve listened to your recordings of his nocturnes more times than I can count.”

“Oh? Tell me which one is your favorite.”

_Not number two in E-flat major, that one is so cliché._

“Opus 37, number one,” he replied, without hesitation.

“In G-minor. Beautiful.”

He kept smiling and, though Wakatoshi would not smile back, the sparkle in his eyes was a bit soft. The furrow in his eyebrows, the one that had been so evident at first, had smoothed itself out.

“Well, what can I help you with, Oikawa-san?” he asked, breaking the silence.

“Just Oikawa is fine. I have a strange favor to ask of you. Are you busy?”

“Not at the moment. I’m happy to help.”

“I’m sure you know that Iwa-chan’s birthday is coming up this weekend. I’m having a bit of trouble thinking of a gift for him.”

“I thought you said you’ve known him for a long time,” Wakatoshi responded.

“It’s complicated.” Tooru crossed his arms and shifted his weight to his other leg. He could feel Wakatoshi’s eyes boring into every inch of his body.

“I don’t know how much help I’ll be. We don’t spend a lot of time talking about personal things.”

“Still. You spend almost all your time together.”

“I suppose so.”

Wakatoshi fell silent, though his eyes never left Tooru. It was amazing, the determination emanating from him, even when he was doing nothing but stand there. Tooru wasn’t sure that he felt intimidated, but he felt something strange. Wakatoshi was overwhelming to be around. That was the only way he could think to describe it.

“How about new running shoes? His are a bit worn,” he finally suggested.

“Oh. That might be a good idea.”

“A nice collar for Gemini.”

“I need a present for him, not his dog,” Tooru sighed.

“Hair gel?”

“You’re kidding, right?”

Wakatoshi didn’t respond, and he certainly didn’t look like he was kidding.

“I’m not very good at this,” he admitted.

“I think I’ve bothered you enough. How about if you think of anything, you shoot me a text?” Tooru suggested.

“I—”

Before either could resist, he whisked the pen from Detective Tendou’s fingers and grabbed Wakatoshi’s left hand. It was rough and warm. Tilting his head, Tooru wrote down his phone number right there on Wakatoshi’s palm, in clear, straight numbers. He felt Wakatoshi’s dark eyes on him the whole time.

“That’s my number. Text me if you have any ideas, hmm?” Tooru patted his hand, smiled at him. Wakatoshi was silent for a moment.

“Okay. I will.”  

Then he smiled back.  


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: very very brief mention of rape

**Chapter 8**

Tooru had never spent this much time roaming through his own home, his thoughts wandering and his imagination conjuring guests. Mostly Hajime. There was Hajime walking through his front door. The heels of Hajime’s shoes clicking on the tiles. Hajime walking beneath dramatic arches to sit down on couches where he could listen to the music that Tooru put on the record player. Or composed for him on the piano. Hajime deciding to stay the night, even though Michiko was lonely. Hajime unbuttoning his shirt, Hajime’s angry, booming voice bouncing off the walls, Hajime’s calloused fingers touching and reclaiming every inch of Tooru’s skin. The thoughts made him dizzy with longing and anguish. He thought about setting alight his fireplace and burning the notebook that he’d dedicated to his ghost letters but couldn’t bring himself to do it. Issei and Takahiro tried to drag him out a few times, came over and bothered him but, other than that, he was mostly alone. Not something he was accustomed to—it tended to leave him with a gap in his stomach.

Two days after Tooru’s strange, not-very-helpful field trip to the Special Investigations office, he was listening to Feltsman’s recordings of Chopin’s nocturnes (he never listened to his own recordings) and reading _The New Yorker_ when his phone rang with an unfamiliar number. He had a hard and fast rule to never answer phone calls from unidentified numbers, but as he stared at the screen of his phone, he inexplicably decided to answer anyway.

“Hello?”

“Oikawa? It’s me.”

It was a voice that, after only meeting once, Tooru could easily recognize.

“Ushijima-keiji, hello,” he replied. “How are you doing?”

“I’m well, thank you. And yourself?”

“You know. Busy.”

“Of course. Is this a bad time to call?”

“No, no, this is fine.”

“I won’t take long. I just happened to think of something you could get Iwaizumi for his birthday. It slipped my mind because he rarely talks about it.”

“What is it? Don’t say something silly like hair gel again, please.”

“It’s not hair gel. I know you’re very well-versed in the world of music, so maybe you could get him something music-related.”

“Music-related? Like a mixtape or something?”

“Juvenile, perhaps, but thoughtful.”

“Hmm. Maybe.”

“You should get him some Billy Joel.”

Tooru had been pacing, pointing his toes as he meandered through his home, but at this he stopped, froze, stared straight forward at the twilight sun behind the window.

“Wh...why would you say that, Ushijima-keiji?”

“It’s all I’ve ever heard him listen to.”

“Oh. Interesting.”

“Quite. Well, I’ve arrived at a crime scene. I have to go—if you need anything, please never hesitate to ask. I’ll help in any way that I can.”

“Yeah. Thanks so much.”

“Bye then.”

As he heard the line click, imagined in his head tall and intense Wakatoshi Ushijima shoving his phone into his pocket, walking onto a crime scene, making everyone around him shrivel, joining his partner, less composed and more emotional Hajime Iwaizumi, Tooru couldn’t move. He kept the phone pressed to his ear as if waiting for one more word, one more breath. He wished for a moment that he were there with him. He wanted to see them solve crimes and put away bad guys together. Wakatoshi Ushijima must have been very smart—and Hajime was undoubtedly very good at getting criminals to confess. And sometimes, Tooru imagined, Hajime would get too worked up. Would start yelling, would bang his fists against tables and walls, and Wakatoshi would have to calm him down with that low gravelly voice. “It’s not worth it, Iwaizumi,” Tooru heard him say.

Finally, he sat down on the couch. Directed his thoughts back to the actual conversation he had had with Wakatoshi. And after thinking about it for a moment, moving across the hills and valleys of his memories, he picked up his phone again and made a few calls.

 

* * *

 

Two little boys sat in a sandbox, and they were competing to see who could build the best, biggest sand castle. They were on a playground with tens of other kids, but they didn’t notice any of the others. They only noticed each other. Hajime had scratches all over his body, a Band-Aid on his knee, a missing tooth, because he liked to run around and adventure and fall off jungle gyms. Tooru was cleaner, fairer, with fewer wrinkles on his face because he always put on sunscreen and never furrowed his brow the way Hajime did.

Tooru was being very careful with his sandcastle—he needed to pay very close attention, work as efficiently as possible, if he was going to win. He was sweating as he worked. Piling the sand over there, shaping it over here, patting it down so it maintained its mold. Across from him, Hajime was much more forceful. His tongue was sticking out of his mouth and he was working quickly, aggressively. If not for the smile on his lips, he would have looked like a very angry little boy.

When time was up (Tooru checked the watch that his older sister had given him for his sixth birthday), they both added little leaves to the top, to signify the completion of their masterpieces.

It was clear, immediately, that Hajime’s was better. Tooru stared at it for a few moments, then looked back at his wildly inferior castle. He pulled gently at the hem of his shirt and his lower lip jutted out into a pout. He shifted his position from foot to foot. Hajime crossed his arms and showed his teeth in a wide, triumphant smile.

“Looks like I win, Oikawa,” he said.

“Yeah...yours is way better,” Tooru replied quietly. He couldn’t look at Hajime’s face. “Good job, Iwa-chan.”

“Are you gonna cry now?” Hajime sighed. His voice was a bit quieter, a bit softer. Tooru began to vehemently shake his head.

“N-no, I’m not gonna cry. You won, fair and square.” His lips began to tremble, and he sniffled in an attempt to curb the tears.

“But...but hey! Yours is really good, too. I bet it’s way better than anyone else except me,” Hajime said. Tooru shrugged, afraid that if he said anything else, he would burst into tears. He blinked his eyes very hard.

In the next moment, Hajime had stepped forward, crushing his victorious castle beneath his feet, and grabbed Tooru’s hands. Tooru looked up to see him smiling, eyes glistening.

“Hey. You’re good at lots of things. And you work really hard at lots of things,” he said. “But it’s okay if you’re not the best at _everything_. Nobody can be the best at everything.”

“Even if they work the hardest?”

“Even if they work the hardest. Like...I could never play piano like you.”

“You could. If you practice for like a million hours.”

“No, not even then. Because you’re the best.”

“Really?”

“Yeah!”

Tooru laughed, and Hajime laughed, too. Tooru wasn’t afraid that he was going to cry anymore. He felt much better. Hajime always made him feel much better.

“Thanks, Iwa-chan. You’re the best at making sandcastles.”

Hajime ruffled his hair. They sat back down in the sand and they rebuilt their sandcastles.

* * *

 

Dinner was ready. He bought a double chocolate cake with raspberry filling because that had always been Hajime’s favorite, and he just assumed that his taste hadn’t changed very much in the past six years. He cooked dinner himself, set the table, made sure the house was clean, put Rachmaninoff onto the record player (even though Hajime had never been a fan). Despite the illusion of formality, the candles and the incense, Tooru himself wasn’t dressed in anything fancy. A pair of leggings, an oversized shirt. He had even gone out and bought a little chew toy, after requesting—practically begging—that Hajime bring Gemini with him.

At eight-o-five, the doorbell rang, and Tooru walked gracefully across the foyer to answer it. Standing there, leash in his hand, dressed in sweatpants, sneakers, a t-shirt that fit nice and snug against his bulging muscles, was Hajime. Next to him, Gemini jumped up, pressing her paws against Tooru’s chest and nearly knocking him backward.

“Gemini! What a big girl you are!” Tooru laughed, squatting to cup her fuzzy face in his hands.

“Why does it smell like the inside of a bakery?” Hajime asked, making his way inside.

“What, you don’t like it?”

“A little too sweet, but what was I expecting.”

“Nothing I ever do is good enough for you.”

Tooru hid his smile as he closed the door. Hajime stepped out of his shoes, got onto one knee and took the leash from Gemini’s collar. As soon as she was free, she zoomed around the vast, open area that was the entirety of Tooru’s home, barking.

“Good thing I don’t have many neighbors,” Tooru winked.

“Oh, shove it. Why does everything look so fancy, anyway?”

“Iwa-chan.”

Tooru stepped in front of him, a hand on his hip and his eyebrow raised. Looking a little bit like a mother about to reprimand her child.

“You didn’t think I would _forget_ , did you?”

Hajime rolled his eyes, but couldn’t keep the smiling from twisting his lips. Tooru reached out, grabbed his hands, squeezed them tight, tight, tight, until he couldn’t tell his own skin from Hajime’s.

“Happy birthday, Iwa-chan.”

“Stop it, you’re just emphasizing the fact that I’m an old man.”

“Twenty-five! That’s not old at all.”

Tooru held his hands in silence for a few moments, and in that silence he felt every drop of sweat that had touched Hajime’s palm. He was weighed down by it all, could see and feel both the absence and the presence of the friendship they had spent so much time building. Climbing over mountains of secrets, skeletons, and lost happy-birthdays, Tooru led Hajime to the dining room for dinner.

They talked so much that it took them an hour and a half to actually finish eating, and by that time, most of the food was cold. But Tooru didn’t mind—and it didn’t seem that Hajime minded, either. They became lost in each other’s lives, the times they had missed.

“It was surreal, seeing you become the most famous pianist in the world,” Hajime said.

“Really? You followed me, all that time?”

“I tried not to, believe me. But you were everywhere. Japan’s pride.”

Tooru told him stories of his travels, strange mishaps at his concerts, the incredible people he had met and the wonderful things he’d learned.

“You’d love New York City,” he pointed out.

“I bet I would. Lots of crime there.”

“Don’t be like that.”

Under the table, Tooru sneaked bits and pieces of his dinner to Gemini. He couldn’t resist her puppy dog eyes.

Hajime told Tooru all about the academy. About how he’d graduated with flying colors, started off as an officer, worked his way up to the Special Investigations unit, where he’d been working for the past year. He decided, perhaps wisely, to omit the gruesome details of the crimes that he investigated.

“We only see the worst of the worst,” he said.

“You get to put the bad guys away.”

“Sometimes. If we’re lucky.”

“Luck has nothing to do with it.”

“Right.”

With each word that Hajime spoke, his voice sounding more and more familiar and more and more nostalgic, cathartic, Tooru fell more in love. He’d already been in love—for longer than he could remember, he had loved Hajime Iwaizumi. But this love, it was refreshed and it was rising up with a vengeance to consume Tooru whole, make him see and hear and think of nothing but that pervasive and intrusive love. He saw Hajime pick at his food and he fell in love; heard Hajime breathe, fell in love; felt Hajime’s legs, so close to his own under the table, fell in love. There was nothing, Tooru convinced himself, that Hajime could have done to make Tooru love him any less. Everything he would have done would only make Tooru love him more. So he took every chance that he could while he ate to look up from his plate, his fork, and center his gaze upon Hajime’s face. Trying to make up for all the time they’d lost. He nearly drove himself crazy trying to figure out what Hajime was thinking. But, out of practice, Tooru’s skills in that department were rusty.         

Though he noticed, from the slight wrinkle between his eyebrows, that Hajime was tense about something. Was chewing his food with unusual ardor. Would bounce one leg, then the other, then both, as if waiting anxiously for somebody to burst through the front door. The wrinkles on his forehead never lapsed, and Tooru knew, at the very least, that that meant he was thinking very hard about something, trying to solve some sort of intangible problem before him. Tooru considered asking him just what he was thinking about, but decided against it.

After dinner, they moved to the veranda outside, glasses of red wine in their hands. Tooru wanted to look at the stars and feel the fresh air and examine the silhouettes of faraway houses with Hajime the way they used to.

“What, no whiskey?” Hajime teased.

“Afraid not.”

“Damn.”

Despite the fact that it was summer, there was the slightest chill. They sat down on one of the couches and Tooru left the door open (with the screen to keep bugs out) so that they could still hear the music from the record player. It was on _Morceaux de fantasie_ now. Tooru wondered if Hajime would recognize it—he’d asked about it before, after all. Gemini joined them out on the veranda and hopped up not next to Hajime, but next to Tooru. It seemed that she was sleepy, so she lay her head on his lap and blinked those large, round eyes.

“Tell me about the case you’re working on,” Tooru said, glancing over. Hajime lifted up a cigarette, and Tooru nodded, so he lit up. More graceful in his smoking than he was in anything else. Tooru couldn’t help thinking about how, at fifteen, Hajime had scoffed at cigarette smokers.

“Right now? It’s a pretty brutal one.”

“I want to hear about it anyway. I want to know about your life.”

“You’re always so cheesy, _Shitty_ kawa.”

“Stop it! I’m trying to be friendly.”

Hajime smirked, took a drag, a sip of his wine, and opened his mouth.

“Gang rape case. Kid was walking through the city a few nights ago, got jumped, raped in an alley.”

“That’s horrible.”

“You’re telling me.” Hajime leaned back, letting his neck arch over the back of the couch. For the first time that night, Tooru noticed how exhausted he looked. Usually, he was too busy being astonished at the very sight of him to notice anything else.

“Do you know why?”

“Still trying to figure it out. He gave us a pretty good description of the perps. Few more days, we should have ‘em.” He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “You’d think that this would get easier, but it doesn’t. You should see how fucking terrified the kid is. Broke my heart when I met him. And then they ask you if it gets better, and what the hell are you supposed to say? How would I know?”

Tooru looked into his wine glass for a moment, then downed the rest of it in one swig.

“They trust you to help them.”

“But how is someone like me supposed to make someone who was brutally attacked ever feel safe again? I can’t do that.”

“You can try.”

Hajime gave a grunt in response and took another drag. Tooru couldn’t help it then, flooded with the memories of Hajime comforting him when he’d been lost. He reached out and let his hand rest on Hajime’s shoulder.

“Do you want more wine?”

“Yes.”

Tooru grabbed the bottle and poured a few more glasses. The elegy ended without Hajime recognizing it.

 

* * *

 

About an hour later, when they had gone through a bottle and a half and Tooru was significantly tipsy, he scurried inside to grab the birthday present that he had managed to get.

“You didn’t have to do this!” Hajime cried, cheeks a bit red, when Tooru plopped down on the sofa, stole his cigarette, took a drag, started coughing uncontrollably.

“I know, but I did anyway. Open it! But don’t cry, I’ll laugh at you.”

He spread his legs out across Hajime’s lap, wrapped an arm around Hajime’s shoulders, leaned his head against the crook of his neck. He smelled like cigarette smoke, red wine, muskiness. Hands shaky and affected by the wine, Hajime managed to get rid of the tissue paper adorning the birthday bag, to reveal a slim, square object.  

 It was a large, thin vinyl record, with a black cover, surrounding a ghostly face and beautiful English cursive that read “Billy Joel/Piano Man”. At the bottom corner was an autograph, made out to Hajime Iwaizumi. Tooru could see Hajime’s breath leave his parted lips when he held it in his hands. The bag dropped onto the floor. His eyelashes fluttered. Tooru smiled. When was the last time he had seen Hajime make an expression like that?

“Oikawa,” he said. His voice was at a whisper, but it was louder in Tooru’s ears than the orchestras he’d spent his life with. Breath warm against his cheek, against the tip of his nose. “How did you...?”

“Do you like it?” Tooru asked. Hajime’s lips were trembling and Tooru willed that they just swallow him whole. If he had reached his hand out, he could’ve cupped Hajime’s scarred knuckles in his palm. But his limbs felt heavy and he felt tired and afraid so he didn’t.

“I...yeah.”

“Autographed just for you, Iwa-chan.”

Tooru pointed at the autograph. Straight from Billy Joel himself.

“How the hell did you get this?”

“I know a lot of people in the music industry. It wasn’t hard.”

“You’re incredible.”

“I know.”

“I remember when we used to sit at the piano, and you would play it over and over and over, and we would sing until we lost our voices,” Hajime murmured.

“We didn’t know what the words meant but we sang it anyway.”

“You amazed me, you know?”

Tooru lifted his face to look properly into Hajime’s droopy eyes.

“I did?”

“Yeah. You did.”

“Not anymore, though?”

Hajime paused and looked away, so Tooru let his head fall back. Without really meaning to, he started to draw patterns with the tip of his finger on the back of Hajime’s hand.

Tooru started to sing, his voice cracking and breaking and hushed.

“He said son can you play me a memory? I’m not really sure how it goes.”

He felt Hajime’s face turn toward him, so he forced his heavy head up again. 

Tooru closed his eyes and let himself fall deeper, until his lips touched Hajime’s and he became lost in his palms against his legs. He swallowed up those lyrics, took in the wine and the cigarette smoke and the Billy Joel from the inside of Hajime’s mouth. The world was a bit hazy, blurred in red wine, and the only thing that was absolutely clear was that Hajime was kissing him.

So it was jarring, heart wrenching, almost physically painful when Hajime pulled away, pushed Tooru from his lap, and stood up. Leaving Tooru cold and empty and with tears in his eyes that he quickly, hastily, desperately blinked away.

“Iwa...”

“Fuck, I’m sorry.”

He was pacing along the veranda, hands on his temples.

“It’s okay.”

“I told you, right? I told you I’m getting married?”

        “Yes.” 

        “I can’t do this. I can’t.”

        Tooru stood up, stumbled a bit, then opened the door to go back inside. Gemini scurried through the open door, then Hajime, trying to catch his breath, and Tooru went in last. 

        What he said next was sudden, even to himself, but it was the only thing he could have said.  

        “Hajime, I don’t think we should see each other alone anymore.” 

        Hajime whirled around, eyes wide, only to find that Tooru’s expression was nothing but serious. Hooded. Covered in shadows he couldn’t escape from. 

        “O-Oikawa, what are you--?” 

        “I’m not strong enough. I can’t do it. Not to myself, not to you.” 

        Hajime gawked at him for a few moments. 

        “You don’t want to see me anymore?” he finally cried. Tooru shook his head. 

        “That’s not what I said. Of course I want to see you. But I don’t think we should be alone again. I’m weak. I won’t abandon you, not again, but I can’t lose you again, either.”

_         I love you too much to do this. _

        Hajime stared in silence. 

        Tooru wondered if he could tell that his heart was shattering. 

        “I think you should go now. I’m sorry.” 

        Hajime blinked. Then, after eternities, he spoke. 

        “I’m sorry, too.”  


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

Did he like the present you bought for him?

Yes, he liked it a lot! Thanks for the recommendation.

I’m glad to hear it.

 

* * *

 

Sorry about last night. I was stupid.

I was, too.

I think you’re right. We shouldn’t be alone anymore.

Yeah.

You’re taking responsibility for me.

Of course. I always have.

I’m sorry for always making you do that.

You do it for me sometimes, too.

 

* * *

 

As Hajime walked out the door, Tooru suddenly remembered so clearly when he’d fainted after 30 hours at the piano.

How old had he been? Ten years old, preparing for a recital. At dawn, when the sun was rising and covering him in orange, purple, pink hues through the expensive but thin curtains on the grand windows of his grand room, he woke up and stretched his arms over his head. His fingers were itching, his heart racing with its desire to create music. His parents were asleep, but they had grown used to sleeping through the piano. Early in the morning, late at night, when their son created magic and they slept through it because it wasn’t _really_ magic to them—since they’d seen the horrors of its birth, since they knew the secrets behind the tricks, it wasn’t magic to them. Just parlor tricks. He jumped out of bed, the soles of his bare feet slamming against the tile, and he heard Mozart because he always heard Mozart when he woke up in the morning. Today it was Rondo alla Turca. He hummed along as he changed out of his pajamas, put on a pair of pants and a button-up shirt even though he wasn’t going to leave the house. He went to the bathroom and brushed his hair, though he was so short he could hardly see his own face in the mirror without a stepping stool. But using it made him pouty.

He scurried downstairs, clenching and unclenching his fists, preparation for his practice. He was going to practice a difficult suite today, but one that he’d insisted on adding to his repertoire. _Suite Bergamasque_ , Debussy, four pieces total. He would start, of course, with the prelude. It would have been sacrilegious otherwise, his ten year-old mind insisted. Bunched up eyebrows and heels that hardly reached the golden pedal, he sat down at the bench. He pretended that he was wearing a tuxedo coattail, so he flipped it over the bench before he sat down. The sheet music was already there, waiting for him.

Before he started practicing the actual piece, he did his chords, his scales, his arpeggios, to warm up his fingers. And then, once he was confident that they were warm and ready, he read the sheet music and he began to practice. The prelude was like a dream—he couldn’t get enough of the first part, it made him wild with desire and fantasy. It reminded him of a bird taking flight, spreading her wings and turning in the air while those below her watched with eyes wide in awe. She was flying over an ocean.

When he was in the middle of practicing the prelude, his mother woke up and came down and brought him a glass of water and a kiss to his cheek. He thanked her, smiled, said, “The water will be my reward for finishing this prelude, Mama.”

“Don’t work yourself too hard, my love. You know your music is wonderful.”

That was just the problem, though. He didn’t know. And, in fact, his music wasn’t wonderful. Not unless he made it so. He had to make it so.

It took him until about noon to commit to memory the entirety of the prelude. It was then that Hajime showed up, ball in-hand and legs eager to run. Tooru’s mother had suggested that he go home, told him that Tooru was having “one of those days,” but he insisted. He knew what that meant, though. That there would be no playing. That he would sit in the piano room, making idle conversation that Tooru often didn’t reciprocate, listening to him practice. When he messed up, interestingly enough, Tooru was relatively quiet. He would pause after the blunder, stare at the keys blankly, take a deep breath, before trying again. As if internalizing every mistake and then erasing it.

Hajime didn’t really like the prelude, but he did like the minuet, because he could run around to it and jump. At least for some parts. Tooru liked playing it, too. He could let his fingers run wild with it. Every so often he would turn over his shoulder and see Hajime twirling around, smile brightening his features, and he would blush madly because the shape of Hajime’s body doing that was somehow so beautiful but he had no way to express that with words. So, music it was.

At around six, he’d memorized the minuet, and was tired and hungry. But he knew himself, knew that if he stood up and went to get food or water or go to the bathroom, the flow of his practice would be irreparable.

“I’ll get you some onigiri,” Hajime said, clapping his hands down on Tooru’s shoulders as he grabbed the next set of sheet music.

“No! I’ll get rice all over the piano.”

“You’re too skinny. You have to eat.”

“Fine!”

While Tooru looked over the sheet music, Hajime sat next to him and they ate snacks together. Tooru always loved it when Hajime sat with him on the piano bench. It made it warmer. He wished that he would do it more often, even though it would severely restrict his movement.

The next piece was Tooru’s obvious favorite—the famous “Clair de lune.”

As soon as he started to play it, he felt himself soaring. Not in this plane, this dimension, anymore, but flying high above in the pink clouds that were soft beneath his toes. In the center of the room, where the notes flittered by and left their marks on the wall, Hajime lay on his back and stared at the ceiling. The piece mesmerized him. Made him want to close his eyes and _dream_.

“Your music makes my chest hurt,” he said to Tooru.

“Good. That’s the point,” Tooru replied in a murmur.

He noticed that there were tears on Hajime’s cheeks, tears born of the music that Tooru himself was playing, tears that Hajime tried desperately to hide. He wiped them vigorously on the back of his sleeve and held in his sniffles, and Tooru let him believe that he hadn’t noticed.

“It’s like I’m...”

“Flying?”

“Yeah. Flying. With birds that are really white.”

“White from the moon.”

“Yeah. The moon.”

“You know ‘lune’ is French for moon.”

“Cool.”

“It’s called that because Debussy was French.”

“Oh. Cool.”

Even as Hajime said all these things, Tooru wasn’t satisfied. He was playing the notes, yes. They were precise and correct, yes. But they weren’t _his_. He hadn’t quite figured out how to make it his own, how to perfect it so that people heard it and cried not because they knew the piece, but because they _didn’t_ know the piece—he wanted to make it new and unfamiliarly beautiful.

He was still practicing “Clair de lune” when Hajime had to go home. Tooru watched him with watery eyes and desperation that he couldn’t quite voice, because his silhouette walking out through the doorway of the room looked unnatural that way. It looked much more natural coming in, not into darkness but into light, not into silence but into music. Tooru’s music.

He moved onto the final piece around midnight. The passepied. It made him feel mischievous and dramatic when he played it, so utterly different from “Clair de lune.” Before his mother went to bed, she put a tray of food on top of the piano despite his protests, kissed his cheek, and told him to go to bed soon. He promised that he would, fully aware that he was making a promise he wouldn’t keep.

When he finished memorizing all of these pieces, he went through them all again, to immerse himself and infuse his own personality, the flair for which he was becoming so famous, into them. He stole his father’s computer so he could listen to other recordings and make notes on the sheet music of things he liked, things he didn’t like, things he would steal and things he wouldn’t steal. Over and over and over again he played the pieces until his fingers hurt and his back hurt and he could hardly play without slouching. He unbuttoned his pants at some point during the night because they were digging into his chubby little stomach. He practiced and recorded himself practicing so that he could go back and scrap his ideas and start new ones. When the sun was starting to rise he burst into tears because he didn’t feel that he was doing well enough and his eyes were aching.

At around ten o’clock the next morning, his mother came down and found him on the floor, unconscious, with the tray of food she had left him over twelve hours earlier untouched. His fingertips were red and his face was pale and his lips chapped. She called an ambulance and rode with him to the hospital, where they said he was suffering from extreme fatigue and dehydration.

“What on earth has he been doing?” the doctor asked his parents.

“He’s been on the piano for a day,” Tooru’s mother replied.

When Tooru woke up to both his mother and father at his bedside, they held his hands and said, “We’re so proud of you, Tooru. Such a hard little worker. You’re going to be a star.”

He could hardly hear them over the “Clair de lune” playing over and over and over again in his head.

 

* * *

 

After Hajime was gone, Tooru played “Clair de lune” again and again, stiffly and sadly, until his fingers stopped working and he put his forehead against the keys and grasped his wrist.   

 

* * *

 

The next day, Tooru was on his couch, staring at the ceiling, while Issei and Takahiro cooked him a shitty dinner. They tried, they really did, he had to give them that. They wanted to make him some good quality fried rice, and he had just laughed and patted their heads and said “okay.” When he looked over at them, he heard a Gershwin tune.

At around eight, he got another text message from Hajime.

Why don’t you come out for drinks with me and the boys tonight? I’ll buy you a nice fancy martini just the way you like as an apology.

You spoil me, handsome man.

Any bars in mind?

Black Cat. The bartender is cute.

Sure lol.

He swung his legs off from the couch and walked to the kitchen.

“We’re going to the Black Cat after you finish this monstrosity,” he announced, tugging on the backs of their frilly aprons.

“Again?” Issei mumbled.

“Yes.”

“You’re getting a bit obsessed, no?” Takahiro added.

“No. Hurry and finish dinner, I’m _starving_.”

The fried rice turned out not so horribly. When they were finished, they hopped on the train to downtown Tokyo, and decided that the air was fresh and they were very full so they would walk the twenty minutes to the bar. They got there about fifteen minutes before Hajime and his group of “boys,” so they grabbed a table in the corner and waited. The cute blond waiter brought them their drinks, though he was very unresponsive to their pleasantries.

“Your glasses are very cute,” Tooru said to him, wishing for a moment that he had worn his own glasses.

“I know. That’s why I bought them.”

“Tell Kuroo I said hi, yeah?”

“No.”

Issei and Takahiro laughed at Tooru’s attempts at friendliness, and though Tooru’s pride was a bit hurt, he laughed along with them. This was at least a distraction from the nightmare that had transpired the night before. When he’d gotten just what he’d been desperate for the past few years, only to have it ripped away, ungraciously and cruelly by his own hand. He was reminded of it again in a rush of anguish when the door of the bar opened and Hajime walked in, with Wakatoshi, Detective Tendou, Michiko, and a younger detective with spiked up black hair and a perpetually perplexed expression on his face in tow. Tooru raised a hand to get their attention, and they started to walk over.

“Detective Iwaizumi?” Kuroo called from the back. Hajime whirled around, nodded, raised a hand in greeting. Kuroo looked surprised, unpleasantly, to see him. He froze a bit, then blinked back to reality. “Uh, welcome. Do you wanna talk to Kenma, or...?”

“No, just here to grab drinks, Kuroo-kun.”

Tooru had never really seen Hajime talk to anybody with such professional seriousness. It caught him off-guard. He watched, frozen in place, almost unaware of Wakatoshi slipping into the seat beside him and Michiko taking the seat across from him. Hajime walked up to the bar to speak to Kuroo for a bit, so Tooru tore his attention away (he didn’t want to be too obvious, after all), and his eyes finally fell upon Wakatoshi and he heard the dramatic melody of Beethoven’s moonlight sonata. He smiled, said hello, felt the heat emanating from his grand body.

“You must be Tooru,” he heard from across the table. He whisked around, taken aback by the sudden and unexpected use of his first name. It was Michiko who had spoken his name through her perfect, pristine, ambitious little lips. Tooru narrowed his eyes a bit.

“Tooru _Oikawa_ , yes,” he replied. He faked a smile, though the sham was a bit too obvious.

“Hajime has told me all about you. You’re very talented. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Her smile was genuine, as was the sparkle in her eyes, but Tooru couldn’t find it in his heart to like her even a little bit. He kept reminding himself that there had to be something about her, something special enough to entice Hajime. But Tooru was petty, so he was choosing not to look very hard for it.

“So, I heard your investigation’s pretty rough,” Tooru said, turning to Wakatoshi. He was sitting very straight, holding a glass of beer and staring at it very hard. As if studying it.

“We’re used to it. The cases never get easier. Murder here, rape there, armed robbery next.”

“That must take a toll on you.”

“We have our ways of coping.”

Tooru leaned his cheek against his hand and stared at Wakatoshi, willing him to stare back.

“And what’s your way of coping, Ushijima-keiji?”

Wakatoshi looked over, eyes hooded but face slack, as if he had let his guard down for this moment so that he could gaze over his walls and into Tooru’s eyes. He shifted in his seat a bit. Fingers clenched more tightly around the glass of beer. Tooru blinked at him, wondering if he could see just how thick his eyelashes were (he’d always been complimented for thick eyelashes), but before Wakatoshi could answer Hajime joined them at the table.

“Sorry about that. Bartender’s involved in one of our investigations,” Hajime said, taking off his coat. He leaned over and planted a kiss on his fiancée’s cheek and Tooru turned away, hot and infuriated. “Oikawa, let me introduce you to my team. Ushiwaka, my partner, Tendou, and Kindaichi. Oh, and you’ve already met Michiko.”

“Pleasure,” he hissed. He could feel Wakatoshi watching him from the corner of his eyes. Hajime, too, seemed to be watching him. Wary, even as he wrapped his arm around his future wife’s shoulders. She was stupidly pretty.

Tooru introduced them all to Issei and Takahiro, to whom Hajime took an immediate liking, and in the midst of this group things felt awkward with Hajime. Perhaps because they knew the only reason they were, together, among all these people, was because they couldn’t bear to be alone because they would do things they would regret. Because he had an engagement ring on his fingers and a woman wearing beautiful red lipstick on his arm.

At least Tooru had gotten good at faking smiles and geniality.

As the night droned on and he drank his little martinis, he found himself drawn into casual, unstrained conversations with Wakatoshi—Ushiwaka, as Hajime called him. Tooru was interested in the conversations because Ushiwaka first pointed out the nuances in his playing. Things that only people who appreciated his music profoundly could notice.

“Some people criticize the sentimentality, but I find it fresh and fluid. Precision, surprisingly enough, isn’t always top priority,” he said.

“I agree! You know, that’s what I’ve _always_ said.”

“There’s so much drama in your performances.”

“You don’t seem the dramatic type, Ushiwaka-chan,” he purred.

“No?”

“Not at all. You seem very serious and no-nonsense.” Tooru scrunched up his eyebrows, just to make a point. He didn’t realize that they were speaking in slightly drunken hushed tones and nobody else could hear their conversation.

“Traits required of a detective.”

“Then I guess you’re very good at your job.”

“I do what I can.”

Tooru smiled and took a sip of his drink. He waved down the blond waiter with the nametag that read “Tsukishima” to order another.

“On me,” Ushiwaka said, taking out his wallet.

“No, no. I’m rich enough to buy my own martini, sir.”

“I want to buy you a drink.”

He said it very matter-of-factly, and in such a punctual way that Tooru couldn’t find the voice to resist. When Tooru just stared at him, Ushiwaka betrayed himself with a little smile.

“The least I can do after all the nights you accompanied me. With your music.”

Tooru turned away when he heard that. The look on Ushiwaka’s face was too much for him. It was too earnest, too genuine, much too innocent and sincere. He wasn’t accustomed to such sincerity and it made him almost angry. So he stared at his reflection in the shininess of the black table, too aware of Ushiwaka beside him handing cash to Tsukishima.

“Why do you like Chopin so much?” he heard himself mumble.

“His music has a beauty that I could never hope to attain. And we’re always attracted to what we can’t have.”

He answered as if he had been practicing.

Tooru didn’t look up at him. He found his gaze inevitably pulled to Hajime across the table, on his third bourbon, laughing with Kindaichi on one side and Michiko on the other. Both of them enthralled by each word he said, totally unaware that Tooru had been enthralled first. He had loved Hajime first. Before any of them had even known him, known the little things about him that made him so incredibly and unfairly lovable. He thought about the kiss and he heard “Piano Man” blasting in his brain and he wanted to bang his head against the wall. But instead he drank the martini that Wakatoshi Ushijima bought for him and thought about how red Michiko’s pretty little lips were.        

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow look references to other stories, i'm consistent/lazy (:


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

Tooru and Hajime didn’t see each other for at least a week after that because everyone else was busy, and as they both knew, meeting alone would have been a bad idea. It would have led to drunkenness even in the absence of wine, touches that were electric and cathartic, nostalgic kisses and regrets because Hajime was engaged, and having sex with the first person he had ever loved would have complicated that immensely. It killed Tooru, but he knew that being alone with Hajime would be too hard, he wouldn’t be strong enough to resist it, he would fall into the sheets with him and be happy and not regret a thing—only to later regret it because Hajime regretted it and every emotion Hajime felt was, by extension, an emotion that Tooru felt. So they kept themselves restrained to the text messages and awkward phone calls and silent memories. Tooru lied and told Hajime that he liked Michiko, that he approved, when the truth was that he never could have approved of Hajime loving anyone that wasn’t him.

He kept trying to compose, but after three weeks, he still hadn’t decided on major or minor. There were too many options, too many stories he wanted to tell. Some major, some minor. It didn’t seem fair to pick one over the other. Maybe he could include a key change. He just wasn’t sure.

It was a strange time to choose, but on Tuesday, Ushiwaka called Tooru. It just so happened that Tooru was in the shower, listening to Chopin, when the call came through, so he didn’t hear it. He listened to the voicemail when he got out of the shower and he blushed and giggled when he heard it.

“Hello, Oikawa. It’s Ushijima. I’m sure you knew that already. Anyway, I’m leaving a message because...I think it would have been easier to talk to you rather than the voicemail. It’s all right, I’ll manage.”

Deep breath.

“I’m leaving a message because I want to buy you dinner. Wait, I’ll be more explicit—I want to take you on a date. But I don’t want to pressure you. You can refuse. I hope that you’ll let me. You’ve had an impact on my life and I want to spend some time with you.”

Another deep breath.

“I’m patient. Take your time. Bye.”

Tooru was both charmed and irritated by his awkwardness. One part of him was intrigued by the way that Ushiwaka couldn’t quite say what he wanted, couldn’t quite get around to what he needed to say. It was cute and innocent. Another part was so annoyed that he couldn’t just get to the point and get over his nervousness to ask Tooru out on this date that he seemed to desperately want. Torn between these parts, Tooru sat, in a towel, on his canopied bed and stared at his phone in indecision. He stared for what seemed like his entire lifetime, trying to decide how he would respond. It wasn’t something unusual. With his status, his talents, his looks, how many times had he been asked to dinner? Drinks? Nights in hotel rooms? Somehow this time seemed different. Ushiwaka seemed a bit more earnest, and still some part of him hated that.

Then he asked himself what there was to lose.

It wasn’t as if he would’ve been betraying Hajime.

Hajime had already betrayed him by falling in love with an ambitious and intelligent investigative journalist who looked incredible in red dresses and lipstick.

(Red was definitely her color.)

In the end, Tooru decided to accept Ushiwaka’s offer.

He was lonely and slightly horny and he figured it would be a good way to get out of the house without Issei and Takahiro dragging him out by blackmailing him with Top 40 playlists and embarrassing photos. Instead of texting Ushiwaka, he called him back. Half-naked and smiling like a cheeky bastard.

“Hello?”

“Ushiwaka-chan, hi.”

“Oikawa. How are you?”

“Good. I got your message.”

“Oh?”

“What’s your favorite restaurant?”

As it happened, Ushiwaka’s favorite restaurant was a small one that wasn’t terribly fancy, but he mentioned that to Tooru over the phone to make sure that he didn’t want anything fancy. Because, as he said, he would be willing to pay for something fancy. He had the money, and he had the will. But Tooru insisted that whatever Ushiwaka wanted was fine. He liked calling him Ushiwaka-chan, though. It helped him fall under the illusion of intimacy. Issei and Takahiro questioned his motives almost instantly, knowing very well the way that Tooru functioned.

“You’re just doing it because he said he liked your Chopin performance,” Takahiro accused.

“So what if I am? Is that a crime?”

“No, but it’s pretty shitty.”

“He’s cute, okay? And he has great biceps.”

“So does Iwaizumi,” pointed out Issei. Tooru felt so angry in that moment that he almost left the room but, instead, he threw a middle finger in Issei’s direction. Then he went to his room with a flourish of his wrist to pick his outfit and cologne for his date with Ushiwaka. And the entire time, he knew he was doing it to spite Hajime. Because he would know—that the boy he had loved, the boy he had pushed away for another woman, was going on a date with his partner and possibly having sex with him. Tooru, in his spitefulness, wanted Hajime to feel that.

He picked his most expensive cologne (the same one he’d been wearing the night he saw Hajime’s ghost) and before he left he played Beethoven’s moonlight sonata. In some weird inexplicable preparation.

He took the train to the nearest station and Ushiwaka was kind enough, earnest enough, to meet him at the station and walk him to the restaurant. He was dressed impeccably, in dark jeans and a white t-shirt and leather jacket—James Dean-ish, which Tooru didn’t think was quite fair. He was only wearing his leggings and an oversized t-shirt. Because he knew Ushiwaka wouldn’t care. Whatever he was wearing Ushiwaka would be attracted. He wasn’t worried about that. Tooru had decided to wear his glasses. When he walked up to Ushiwaka on the platform, adjusting the bag on his shoulder, he saw the slightest change in Ushiwaka’s expression. But he couldn’t tell where it came from. A softness in his eyes? The slightest twitch of his lips? A slackness in that chiseled jaw, those thick dramatic eyebrows? Something that made Tooru feel an unexpected rush of sympathy.

As Tooru opened his mouth to greet him, Ushiwaka pulled a hand from his back to reveal a single rose. Tooru stared at it, mouth still agape, as everyone else on the platform rushed by in a blur. But that rose, that single rose encased in Ushiwaka’s dark calloused hand, was so clear. Every detail of it—the curl of the petals, the smoothness of the stem from the thorns that had been meticulously pulled off, the redness, the perfect redness, a dot of red in a sea of colorless fog. Tooru could hardly stand to see it there.

“A sign of my gratitude, I suppose,” Ushiwaka said, uncertainty in his voice. Tooru looked up at him, staring fearlessly into Tooru’s eyes. So goddamn earnest. He reached out to take the rose.

“You’re so cheesy,” he finally replied with a smile. Ushiwaka gestured toward the exit of the station, and they started walking.

“Perhaps. But I like traditions.”

“Traditions. If you wanted to show gratitude you should’ve gotten me a dark pink rose, not a red one.”

The rose that he held made his palm burn a little bit.

“I’m not too knowledgeable about flower meanings,” Ushiwaka admitted. They walked out onto the street, met with the soothing barrage of the city. As they walked, Tooru noticed that Ushiwaka had a strange way of walking, with his hands down at his sides and his steps always the same exact length. Hajime liked to put at least one hand in his pocket when he walked.

“I think you’re lying,” Tooru replied.

“Oh?”

“I would bet five million yen that you have your very own garden.”

Ushiwaka didn’t respond for a moment, staring straight ahead as he walked. Then, he turned his face just slightly, almost teasingly, toward Tooru.

“You’re observant.”

“I would also bet that you didn’t grow up in Tokyo.”

“Is it so obvious that I’m not a city boy?”

“Yes.”

The restaurant was small, but Ushiwaka had made reservations, and there was a table ready for them. It was a traditional Japanese-style place, cash only, which had been Tooru’s first hint that Ushiwaka wasn’t really the urban type. They took off their shoes and sat on the mats, in a dimly lit room where it seemed like everyone was telling secrets, voices quiet. Tooru put the rose down next to him and was too aware of it for the entirety of the meal. And, throughout everything, the gentle seriousness on Ushiwaka’s face remained. Tooru couldn’t help but imagine the kind of fear he could instill in the suspects he interrogated.

“We always talk about me,” Tooru started, before Ushiwaka could even open his mouth. “I want to hear about you. Why a detective?”

Ushiwaka pondered the question for a moment. But only a moment.

“My answer’s cliché, but it’s always been the same. I can’t tolerate those who transgress on the rights of others. I’ve always felt a lot of conviction about it. That I want to protect.”

“Protect, huh?” Tooru leaned forward and started tinkering with his chopsticks. “I guess it’s cliché, but Iwa-chan always described it differently. He always said that he wanted to put the bad guys away.”

“I suppose I think less about the perpetrator and more about the victim.”

Ushiwaka paused, looked down at his lap, and kept speaking.

“That sounds an awfully self-righteous thing to say. I don’t mean to say that I’m better than Iwaizumi.”

“That’s not how it sounded,” Tooru lied.

“Ironically enough, Iwaizumi is much better with victims than I am. His manner of speaking to them is softer.”

“I’m sure you have your ways, and he has his. I bet you’re good partners.”

“We balance each other.”

“Iwa-chan’s like that.” Tooru didn’t quite realize that he was talking about Hajime again. “Good at keeping people in line and letting himself be kept in line.”

“That’s a good way of putting it.”

Tooru wondered if Ushiwaka noticed the glaze that came over Tooru’s eyes when he spoke about Hajime. The melody in his head was a horrible medley of Billy Joel and Beethoven.

Ushiwaka explained to Tooru that he’d grown up in a small town outside of Sendai, which actually wasn’t far from where Tooru himself grew up. He spoke about himself bluntly and stoically, even as he explained the divorce of his parents when he was twelve, and his father’s move overseas. Ushijima, he explained, was his mother’s name, and he made sure to emphasize that he was proud to have taken her name. His father had been a detective as well.

“I admit my father had a big impact on me,” was the way he put it.

He explained without so much as a hint of emotion that when he was about twelve his father had been injured on the job. Working a yakuza case, he’d been shot and permanently injured—after that, he couldn’t work anymore and his parents had gotten divorced. His father no longer lived in Japan. Ushiwaka had grown up with his mother.

“Your childhood is much more dramatic than mine,” Tooru sighed. He absentmindedly stirred his miso soup. “Grew up in a well-off family. Showed talent from a young age and they encouraged me. Paid for my piano lessons and private tutors and the works.”

“They must love you.”

“Yeah, you would think.” Bitterness dripped from his tongue. Ushiwaka blinked.

“Do you not think so?”

It was a blunt, perhaps tactless attempt to understand Tooru better.

“It’s complicated,” was all Tooru said. Ushiwaka took the hint.

“I’m sorry if I crossed a line.”

“No, no, it’s fine.”

“Tell me more about your music.”

“My music? Are you sure?” He raised an eyebrow suggestively. “If I start, I won’t stop, you know.”

“I know.”

For the next two hours (they ordered a full meal and Tooru had some saké) Tooru and Ushiwaka talked about music incessantly. It was fresh, comforting, and at the same time terribly maddening for Tooru to talk about a world in which he no longer had a place. They talked about the nuances of Chopin’s nocturnes, the drama and romanticism of Rachmaninoff’s piano concertos, they talked about Bizet’s operas and Stravinsky’s ballets and they talked about how it all felt. Tooru from the perspective of the one playing, Ushiwaka from the perspective of the inspired one sitting in the audience. Mesmerized, immobile and silently filled to the brim with passion. Tooru noticed that Ushiwaka was left-handed.

“I’ll admit now that I saw you in concert,” Ushiwaka said toward the end of the dinner.

“Which one? I can’t promise I’ll remember you, though,” Tooru winked.

“Your last one. I won’t overstep my boundaries and ask you why you’ve retired. Not yet.”

Ushiwaka hadn’t mentioned or dropped any hints that he was well aware of Tooru’s withdrawal from concert piano. Tooru blinked, his cup frozen in midair, unsure of how to respond to Ushiwaka’s stone face and fire eyes.

“You played _Morceaux de fantasie_ , _Liebestraume_ , Chopin’s waltz in c sharp minor and, of course, his ‘ _Valse de l’adieu_ ,’” he said.

“You were there. At my very last concert,” Tooru smiled. Ushiwaka nodded.

“It was haunting. Beautiful.”

“The first time I heard ‘ _Valse de l’adieu_ ’ I was...what, seven, maybe? Rubinstein. I cried for an hour.”

At that, Ushiwaka finally let the smallest of smiles touch his lips.

“I also saw you perform Chopin’s nocturnes a while back.”

“You do like Chopin a lot.”

“Don’t you?”

“Of course. I think he’s brilliant. Perhaps the best pianist to have ever lived.”

Ushiwaka shook his head decisively.

“No. I think that’s you.”

 

* * *

 

They walked around the city for a bit after dinner. Walking by Ushiwaka’s side, Tooru felt the urge to reach over and link his arm through his, but somehow, whenever he started to move, he found that he couldn’t finish and would let his arm fall back to his side. Like there was a strange, thin invisible barrier between them. They were walking close, but not close enough that their arms touched. He was still holding the rose and his fingers hurt. They walked aimlessly—though, perhaps Ushiwaka knew where he was going and why, but Tooru certainly didn’t. He just walked, followed the twists and turns that Ushiwaka made. He probably knew this city, the good and the horrible, much better than anyone else Tooru knew. They didn’t talk a lot while they walked, and somehow, Tooru didn’t mind. The silence was a warm kind of silence, augmented by the warmth of the setting sun and the crowded streets of summertime Tokyo.

“It’s late. You have work tomorrow, don’t you?” Tooru said after maybe an hour of this stroll. Though the truth was that he wouldn’t have minded walking a little more. He was still torn, in the strange limbo of being charmed by Ushiwaka’s bluntness, awkwardness, honesty, and being infuriated by the tactlessness and earnestness that defined his every word and gesture. It was inexplicable, irrational, and unfair anger. He knew that. And he knew it was unfounded.

“I do have work tomorrow.”

“Why don’t you walk me to the station and we’ll call it a night, hmm?”

Ushiwaka shook his head.

“I’ll drive you home,” he said.

“Drive me? No, you don’t have to go to the trouble.”

“It’s no trouble. My car is around the corner.” He started to walk before Tooru could protest again. “Riding passenger seat in a nice car is much more comfortable than the train.”

“I can’t argue with you there, chauffeur.”

Tooru didn’t know much about cars, so all it looked like to him was a nice black sedan. Ushiwaka opened the passenger door for him like a real gentleman. Tooru almost curtsied. Before they started driving, Ushiwaka told Tooru that he was welcome to play with the radio or plug in his phone—it wasn’t a long drive, but he assumed that Tooru would want to control the music anyway. And he did. He plugged in his phone and they listened to Yiruma. Silent on the drive back, but comfortable. The awkwardness that Tooru expected wasn’t there. Ushiwaka, he was awkward, but his presence there, his silence, the way he looked and felt sitting there in the car next to Tooru, none of that was awkward. Tooru quite liked being driven through the city in the car of a man who had more or less admitted to being head over heels for him. He directed Ushiwaka toward his home, with its extravagant driveway and garden (to which he never personally attended) and ornate front door.

Ushiwaka opened the door for Tooru to get out and walked him all the way to the door. Hands still swaying at his side, never in his pockets, never crossed, never anywhere but there. Tooru could have so easily held his hand if he wanted to.

“Thank you for letting me buy you dinner,” he said at the door. Tooru felt like he was in high school, getting dropped off at the door like this.

“I should be the one thanking you. I’m very expensive.”

“I just hope you enjoyed yourself,” Ushiwaka continued. “I know I’m not the best at conversation.”

Tooru was taken aback, touched, by the unhindered admittance. He shook his head.

“N-no. I did. I enjoyed myself.”

“Good.”

They both paused. Paralyzed. Ushiwaka looked very beautiful—no, Tooru didn’t know if beautiful was the right word. He looked like _something_ that he couldn’t explain, there on the doorstep, beneath the stars and the light from above the doorway. He was tall and dark and handsome and yet there was such softness emanating from him in that particular moment. Tooru smiled.

“Do you...want to come inside? I can make you some tea.”

“No,” Ushiwaka replied. “No, I won’t, but thank you.”

“Maybe another time, then.”

“It’s not because I don’t want to,” he continued. Now there was a hint of desperation in his voice, like he needed Tooru to understand something that he couldn’t properly explain. “But I don’t want to take anything for granted. I want to go slow. I want to do it right.”

Tooru’s heart swelled.

“Want to do what right?” he murmured.

“Can I take you out again?” Ushiwaka murmured back.

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

“Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me for every little thing, you know.”

“I want you to know how I feel.”

“Then just tell me how you feel.”

“I already told you,” he said, “I’m not very good at this.”

“I think you’re doing fine,” Tooru replied. Their voices both hushed, whispering in thick shades that surrounded them, encased them.

“I’m going to say good night now. I don’t want to spoil anything. I want to do it right,” he repeated. As if to reassure himself.  

“Okay. Go ahead.”

“Good night, Oikawa.”

“Good night, Ushiwaka-chan.”

He turned, about to walk back to the car, but before he took a single step, he faced Tooru straight on one more time. Folded at the waist, leaned forward, and put his lips gently and chastely on Tooru’s blushing red cheek. Without another word, leaving Tooru as breathless as a high schooler getting kissed underneath the bleachers, Ushiwaka walked back to his car and drove off. Moonlight Sonata faded after him.

Alone in his home, Tooru threw the rose in the trash and held back angry, frustrated tears because he knew he would never be able to fall in love with Wakatoshi Ushijima. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like Ushijima just needs a hug.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

        Tooru finally decided on minor key.

        For the few days after earnest, heart-shattering and anger-inducing Detective Wakatoshi Ushijima took Tooru out for dinner and kissed his cheek as if he were ten and not twenty-five, he just glided through his home. Arms out, pencil in one hand and notebook in the other. A single note would come to him, so he would jot it down, play it over and over and over until his house was drowning in it, and then he would scratch it out and start on another. Eyes bloodshot, hands shaking, knuckles redder than the blood pulsing through his aching heart. He was starting to get unbelievably frustrated, and he wrote letters in his little pink notebook with the ribbon; letters to Chopin, Rachmaninoff, Liszt, begging them to give him some tips. Anything that would help him find the composer waiting to come out, since the performer had withered.

        He wanted Hajime to be in his house with him. He didn’t have to be doing anything. Just lounging on the couch, scrolling through his phone, one leg crossed over the other. Smoking a cigarette and making Tooru’s house smell. Letting his narrow, dark eyes wander from the floor to the ceiling to the piano gathering dust. He didn’t have to say anything, either. Just breathe. Just blink. Just be there, long enough that Tooru got accustomed to his presence. Alone in that house, Tooru couldn’t stop hearing distorted, off-key melodies in his head. Almost Mozart, but not quite. Almost Tchaikovsky, but not quite. Everything was off, out-of-control, confusing and just not right. When the pings on his phone went off and he ran to see Hajime’s messages, only to find that they were Ushiwaka’s, he couldn’t understand the constrictions of his heart. Anger, frustration, relief, overwhelming joy all at once congealing to solidify, crystallize him in twisted unnatural forms. He wasn’t sleeping very well.

        At ten o’clock in the morning three days after his dinner with Ushiwaka, his cheek still burning and blistered from that too-chaste kiss, Tooru’s phone started to ring. He saw the caller, caught his breath, and answered.

        “Hello, stranger,” he said into the phone.

        “Yo, Shittykawa.”

        “When are you gonna stop with that unsavory nickname?”

        “When you stop warranting it.”

        “Why did you even call? To tease me?”

        Hajime laughed and Tooru had to sit down on his bed.

        “No. I actually have something important I need to ask you.”

        “Important? Okay. What’s up?”

        “I...would really rather do it in person.”

        “Oh.”

        “I’m free for lunch. Noon okay?”

        “But I—”

        “Don’t worry. We’ll go to a café or something. Somewhere public.”

        “Okay. Noon sounds fine.”

        “Why don’t you come by the precinct and we’ll find a café.”

        “All right. I can do that.”

        “Great. Thanks. See you in a few hours.”

        Hajime hung up, leaving Tooru to stare at his phone screen for who-knows-how-long. His stomach wouldn’t stop turning, he felt lightheaded, when he happened to pass by the mirror he was pale. But he put on a pair of jeans and his glasses and went to meet Hajime at noon anyway.

        Hajime was already waiting outside the precinct when Tooru arrived (you always have to be fashionably late, don’t you?), and side-by-side they walked down the road until they hit a café that Hajime said had good sandwiches. They walked in, grabbed a booth, fiddled awkwardly with their menus and glasses of water. Tooru still felt lightheaded and terribly anxious.

        “How’s work?” Tooru asked.

        “Fine. We’re so close to making the arrests.”

        “Great! That’s great.”

        “Yeah. How about you? Doing okay?”

        He sounded genuinely concerned, and when Tooru looked up into his face, he couldn’t stand the pitying look that was there waiting.

        “Doing wonderfully,” he replied smoothly. And with a smile to boot.

        “Liar.”

        “Why? What would I have to lie about?”

        “What do you do all day? Sit around in that big house by yourself?”

        Hajime had always been able to see right through him.

        “It’s nice to relax.”

        “And then what?” Hajime insisted. Tooru kept his lips pressed tightly against each other, adjusting his glasses and recalling Issei and Takahiro pestering him about the future. It wasn’t as if he necessarily needed to do anything. He had enough money (and would continue to make money off recordings) to last him the rest of his life, but Hajime was right. Tooru had never been the type of person who needed relaxation. He didn’t just get bored, he got horribly restless.

        “I’m gonna compose,” he said quietly. “Maybe I’ll travel. Write a book.”

           Hajime didn’t respond, so they fell into a dense lull. The waiter came over and took their orders. Then their gazes shifted back to the dusty table. Tooru’s perfectly filed fingernails tip-tapping on the hard surface, while he tried to push aside the nausea building up in his stomach. Why did he feel this so intensely? He hadn’t felt this with Hajime.

        It was the kiss, of course. It was the fact that Tooru couldn’t even stand to be around him because Hajime didn’t love him. And they both knew it, too, that was the worst part, wasn’t it.

        “So...you and Ushiwaka, huh?” Hajime said. Tooru adjusted his glasses and shifted in his seat.

        “I don’t know. He’s handsome and he buys me dinner.”

        “Oh, bite me.”

        “He’s nice, I guess.”

        “You guess?”

        Tooru didn’t want to talk to Hajime about Ushiwaka.

        “I think he really likes you,” Hajime added.

        Tooru ignored him and changed the subject.  

        “So what’s so important that you had to drag me out here?” Tooru finally said, forcing the coquettishness into his tone. “Don’t tell me it’s just an excuse to see my pretty face.”

        “You wish,” Hajime scoffed. “No, I actually have something I need to ask you.”

        Tooru nodded, gestured for Hajime to continue. He seemed suddenly nervous, wringing his hands. He couldn’t maintain eye contact. Tooru felt another wave of nausea and suddenly, it didn’t seem so much in his mind. He really did feel lightheaded.

        “So...I told you I’m getting married.”

        _Only a million times._

“Yeah, in December. Because Michiko likes the snow,” he said pettily.

        “Right. December. Well...”

        Tooru raised his eyebrows and waited patiently for Hajime to spit it out. He wasn’t as abrasive as Hajime. He wouldn’t force it out of him, not by conventional means like that. Finally, Hajime glanced up and looked straight into Tooru’s eyes.

        “I want you to be my best man.”

        The waiter came over and put their sandwiches in front of them.

        “Your best man?”

        Hajime nodded. He looked steely, unflinching. Tooru blinked a few times, because the world was starting to spin.

        “All that fuss over a simple question like that?” he laughed. Hopefully not too forced. “You really have changed, Iwa-chan!”

        “Cut it out, I’m serious!”

        “I know you are, that’s what makes it so funny.” Tooru leaned forward and flashed a brilliant, shrewd smile. “What, did you think I would refuse such a sincere request?”

        “You know, you really are a piece of shit.”

        “Stop being so touchy. I would be honored to be your best man.”

        He was honored. Honored that Hajime would ask, honored that Hajime felt that they were close enough for this—because at some point, Hajime had had to sit down and think, who do I want to do this? Who do I want to brand as the most important friend in my life? And in the end he had picked Tooru.

        But it was still Michiko he was marrying.

        They were able to fall into casual conversation after that, whisking through their lunches because Hajime needed to get back to work. He’d been right. The sandwiches were good. But Tooru could hardly taste it. He felt as if he were moving in a haze, stomach still churning.

        “It’s on me. I made you come all the way out here,” Hajime started.

        “Don’t be ridiculous.”

        Tooru stole the check right out of the waiter’s hands and paid for it all himself. As he bent over it to sign, a rush came over his body. He paused, caught himself, then pressed his fingertips to his sweating forehead and signed the check.

        “Hey...are you okay?”

        Hajime’s voice sounded a bit too loud. Tooru waved it away with his hand, mumbling that he was fine, just a headache. With the check paid, he made to stand.

        “Oikawa, you look really pale.”

        Tooru shook his head and that made his entire body flare up, but he stood up anyway, bracing himself on the edge of the table. Hajime hurried to his feet, moving forward—he could see that Tooru’s body wasn’t steady.

        “I’m fine.”

        Tooru took a step toward the door.

        “Hey!”

        His knees buckled and he fell, and everything went black.

 

* * *

 

        _I love you, too, Tooru._

Fingertips, cold and light, brushed his lips. Smoothed them out.

        _I’ll be here when you get back._

Pressure on his forehead—fire then rain.

        _I’ll still love you, Tooru._

Carried on clouds, floating in a sea of flames.

        _I promise._

 

* * *

 

_Sing us a song, you’re the piano man. Sing us a song tonight._

_Well we’re all in the mood for a melody._

_And you’ve got us feeling all right._

 

* * *

 

Or...was it the Moonlight Sonata he was hearing?

 

* * *

 

        When Tooru opened his eyes, his head was hurting with a terrible, sharp pain, and he was covered in sweat. He was alone in a bright (too bright) room, in a bed that wasn’t as comfortable as his own, and his limbs felt heavy and his senses dull. Someone had taken off his glasses—he could hardly see anything. He didn’t know where he was or how he’d gotten there and that frightened him. The last thing he remembered was signing the check at the café, and Hajime’s voice saying, “Oikawa, you look really pale.” But when he looked around the room, sluggishly, he didn’t see Hajime anywhere.

        He tried to sit up, and just doing that made his body flare up again. Though he felt hot, unbelievably hot, he started to shiver and fell back down to the bed, gripping the blanket. Just then, the door opened, and Tooru saw two blurry silhouettes walk into the room. One he recognized immediately as Hajime—he didn’t need his glasses to see him. He just knew. The other, though was unfamiliar.

        “You’re awake,” he heard Hajime say.

        “Where are my glasses? Can I have my glasses?” was Tooru’s involuntary response. Hajime came closer and, after a few moments, put his glasses on for him. The first thing he saw with clarity was Hajime’s face. Wrinkled in concern, eyes dark and gleaming. He was still wearing the clothes he’d worn at the café, so it couldn’t have been too long ago. The other person in the room, Tooru finally saw, was a doctor.

        The doctor told him that, based on how he’d been when he’d arrived to the emergency room and what Hajime had told them, it wasn’t serious. Tooru had had a fever and gotten lightheaded—so when he’d stood up at the café, he’d gotten dizzy, fallen, and been unlucky enough to hit his head against the corner of the table. Again, nothing serious. A gash on his head that had started bleeding and knocked him out.

        “I was scared shitless,” Hajime added. He’d taken Tooru immediately to the emergency room. Where they had assured him that Tooru was fine—just a fever, not uncommon, and some stitches. In the midst of the story, Tooru reached up and felt gauze wrapped around his head. He must have hit his head pretty hard. After assuring Tooru and Hajime that everything was fine, the doctor left, telling them that when Tooru felt up to it, he could be discharged and sent home. When Tooru and Hajime were alone, Hajime fell down into a chair by the hospital bed and let out a sigh of relief.

        “Sorry for scaring you,” Tooru teased, though the fever was still affecting him. The medicine they’d given him hadn’t quite kicked in yet. “And for making you skip work.”

        “You never listen to me! I told you that you didn’t look good, but you never fucking listen,” Hajime breathed. Tooru smiled.

        “It’s like when I used to faint at the piano. When we were younger. Remember?”

        “So stupid. How many times did you have to go to the fucking hospital?”

        “More than we could count.”

        They laughed. Nostalgically. Uneasily.

        “It’s just a fever,” Tooru heard himself say.

        “It came out of nowhere, though.”

        “It happens.”

        “I think you should run some more tests.”

        Tooru took a deep breath and tried to sit up again. Hajime leapt to help him, fluffing the pillow, holding his shoulder. Tooru stared down at his hands, shaking and red, in his lap. His entire body was starting to shake—not just from the fever. He could feel Hajime’s hard gaze on him.

        “I don’t need more tests.”

        “Oikawa...”

        He closed his eyes. Tried to imagine that he was somewhere else. A concert hall, sitting at a piano, as everybody fell quiet to hear him play. Whispers and murmurs of excitement, deep breaths in that haunting silence before he touched fingers to piano keys. But when he opened his eyes he was still in a hospital room.

        “Oikawa. Are you gonna tell me what’s up?”

        Hajime’s voice was uncharacteristically gentle. It scared him.

        “The doctor called it rheumatoid arthritis,” Tooru murmured. He lifted his hands and stretched the out in front of him. His fingers were shaking. A bit swollen. Red. “Stiffness and swelling in the joints. Starts small, but can spread. Comes with fatigue and fevers.”

        Quoting the words he’d heard from his doctor about two months ago. Finally, Hajime spoke.

        “I thought arthritis only affects middle-aged people.”

        “That’s what I thought. But I’m a ‘unique case,’” he laughed dryly. “In more ways than one, I guess.”

        He looked up. Hajime was staring at him with such pitying eyes. It made his heart feel as if it were about to burst into angry, fiery pieces.

        “That’s why you...” he started, but his voice trailed off.

        “Why I can’t play piano anymore.”

        He held his right hand in his left, squeezed his wrist until he felt pain, and gritted his teeth. Hajime was the first person other than his parents that he’d told.

        “My body’s finally betrayed me. After all the years that I didn’t treat it right, it’s finally revolted.”

        Hajime was silent.

        “Just imagine. The one thing I love to do I can’t do anymore. Because my fingers won’t work. Isn’t it fucking hilarious?”

        “No. It’s not.”

        “Sure it is. It kills me, it’s so funny.”

        Tooru laughed quietly. Sadly. Before he realized it, Hajime had moved. Was sitting on the bed beside him. Had, without warning, grabbed his shaking, swollen hands. He blinked away his tears in desperation. He’d already cried once in front of Hajime, and that was one time too many.

        “You know you can talk to me, right?” Hajime murmured. Tooru nodded. “And...you know you don’t have to be so strong around me. You know that.”

        This time, Tooru shook his head.

        “Yes I do. I have to be. If I’m not strong, who will be?”

        “You can cry if you want to. You can scream. You can be angry. I want you to be angry.”

        “About what? I have no reason to be,” he lied.

        Hajime reached up, lifted Tooru’s chin forcefully, until he had nowhere to look but Hajime’s iron features.

        “You have a lot of reasons to be. You don’t have to be strong all the time, Tooru.”

        Before Tooru had the chance to say anything else, Hajime wrapped his arms around him and pulled him against his chest. Tooru could do nothing, say anything, but rest his head against Hajime’s neck and let the tears flow. Reach up and grasp at his shirt, because he needed to feel it on his skin. Focus on Hajime’s hands running up and down his quivering back.

        And for the first time in Tooru’s life, he didn’t hear any melodies. Any music whatsoever.

        All he heard was the sound of his own sobs.   


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

Tooru couldn’t play any piano for the next week. His fingers were flaring up—it was the first time he’d experienced this prolonged, forced inactivity in his fingers. He tried to compose despite this, but found it nearly impossible when he couldn’t play the melodies for himself. Of course he needed to compose something that he himself could play. Without the piano at his disposal, with his fingers as cramped and rebellious and withered as they were, he couldn’t compose a single measure. The frustration built up inside him and he didn’t leave his house for three days. The music he always heard grew fainter. He distracted himself with books that had been collecting dust on his bookshelf (I told myself I’d read these one day), reacquainting himself with mainstream music and hating himself for it, listening to unique recordings, catching up on the Netflix shows his friends had been pestering him to watch. He ate too many potato chips and ramen, didn’t drink enough water, ignored his friends too often. An occasional reply to Issei and Takahiro, a brief phone conversation with Hajime. Ignoring his mother completely.

The one person he talked to regularly for those three days was Wakatoshi Ushijima.

Talking to Hajime too often was painful. It made him feel Hajime’s absence, and the inevitability of his absence, all too profoundly. The closer Tooru was to him, the more keenly he was aware of the distance between them. His heart yelled that there was danger, that it was walking toward a wildfire and if it took another step it would burst into scalding white flames and shrivel and die. Hajime was there in that fire with red lipstick on his skin, left there from the loving butterfly kisses of his wife-to-be. And though he beckoned with flame-protected fingers for Tooru to come into that fire with him, Tooru realized that Hajime didn’t know any better. He didn’t realize that if Tooru were to take his hand—talk to him on the phone, text him, go out with him, until they were back to eighteen years old—Tooru would burn. He didn’t realize that Tooru was flammable. Part of it must have been because he was an idiot, because how could he not realize? When he had kissed Tooru and then pushed him away? How could he not know that he struck a match against his chest? The other part, though, was blindness.

Tooru understood that Hajime didn’t want to believe that he and Tooru could never go back to the way they’d been before.

But Tooru needed to look out for himself. And if forcing distance, wedging coldness, between Hajime and him, would spare his heart even a little bit of pain, he had to. He couldn’t afford to fall even more in love—not when he already couldn’t fathom loving anybody else. Because his mind, his heart, his soul, had all grown accustomed to it. They didn’t know what it was to not love Hajime Iwaizumi, which was exactly why he had to keep his distance.

Talking to Wakatoshi Ushijima wasn’t like that.

It was easy. It was comfortable. The music he heard wasn’t painful and intensely remorseful when he talked to Wakatoshi Ushijima. Tooru could send a message and know that, on the other end, Ushiwaka’s fingertips were tingling in desperation to respond. On the other end was somebody who wanted to talk to him, somebody who had nothing at stake and who wasn’t expecting anything. Someone whose earnestness made Tooru sick to his stomach, queasy with pleasure and confusion. Ushiwaka was investing himself in talking to, being with Tooru, and there was such a rush in the admiration. It was a feeling Tooru had known and relished since youth—but it had been so long since he’d felt it from someone other than a distant fan who admired him for his music, his charismatic smile. But Ushiwaka admired more than that. From closer. It was a rush, it really was. And when Tooru found himself following Ushiwaka, it wasn’t toward fire. There was no risk of being hurt. Tooru had nothing to lose.

He didn’t really have anything to gain, either, but he tried not to think about that.

Ushiwaka told Tooru every chance he could that he wanted to take him out properly again, once this investigation finally worked itself out. Tooru was patient, because he got phone calls. Text messages. There were no awkward silences (there never really had been) to deal with and he could laugh at Ushiwaka’s bluntness, tactlessness, from the comfort of his couch and with a glass of wine in his hands.

But there was the nagging that Tooru couldn’t really ignore, as much as he tried. It was a thorn in his side, a little angel on his shoulder whispering in his ear in reprimanding, maternal tones, to be careful. To not get in deep, because there was nowhere for him to go. If he tried to go deep with Ushiwaka, the result was inevitable: he would bob at the surface, pushing Ushiwaka down beneath him to help him float. There was nowhere for them to go together, no way for Tooru to give Ushiwaka a heart that was already with somebody else. He tried to take it back, he tried, he tried so hard, but it was gone for good and nobody else (not Tooru, not Ushiwaka) could have it to themselves ever again.

But Tooru liked the compliments.

The awkward stumbles into passionate confessions.

He liked knowing that if he told Ushiwaka to kneel at his feet, he would do it.

Better yet, Ushiwaka would probably end up doing just that without being told.

 

* * *

 

Tooru drank a lot of wine, so he could hate himself a little bit less.

* * *

 

After three days, Tooru was lying on his couch, arm draped over his head, in nothing but his shorts. The sun was pouring in through the windows and making his skin clammy and uncomfortable. He considered getting a cat. As he stared dispassionately at the ceiling, eyes glazed over like marbles, his phone started to ring. He answered it languidly, knowing who it was without even having to check the screen.

“Hey there,” he purred.

“Good, I caught you. Are you busy?”

“Mm, not at the moment.”

“I don’t have long for my break, but I wanted to call and ask you properly.”

“Ask me what?” he teased.

“Will you let me cook dinner for you? I want to show you my apartment and make you something.”

“I didn’t know you could cook, Ushiwaka-chan.”

“I’m quite good.”

“I’ll be the judge of that.”

“Is tonight okay? I know it’s short notice.”

“Sure. Why don’t I meet you at—?”

“No,” he interrupted, “I want to do it right.”

“You always say that and I can never understand it, you know?”

“I’ll pick you up from your house.”

“Seems like a lot of work to drive over, drive back, and then drive here again.”

“I really want you to see my apartment.”

“What if I really want you to see my house?”

Ushiwaka paused on the other end, and Tooru held his breath.

“Then I’ll see your house.”

Tooru agreed to let Ushiwaka pick him up at his home and drive him back into the city, where he claimed to have a nice apartment ideal for cooking dinner for handsome pianists. He did himself up real nice. Gel in his hair, brightening cream on his face, nice clothes that weren’t leggings and a t-shirt. Really nice cologne and an expensive watch, though he couldn’t help but think it looked horribly ugly next to his tomato-red fingers. He kept it on anyway. He could hear Moonlight Sonata hours before Ushiwaka arrived, but he couldn’t play it.

At exactly seven o’clock, his doorbell rang. He forced a smile to his face, staring at his reflection, and when he approved of the rosy blush in his cheeks, went to answer the door. There stood Ushiwaka, dressed as impeccably as always, and that stupidly nice, stoic expression on his face. The sparkle in his eyes wasn’t dull, though. It never was.

“Hey,” Tooru greeted. Ushiwaka leaned forward and kissed his cheek, hands awkwardly at his sides. Tooru hated that he was so charmed.

“You look nice,” Ushiwaka said.

“Obviously. Ready to go?”

With a smile, Ushiwaka nodded and led Tooru out to his car.

Tooru asked Ushiwaka about how work was going in the car ride, and Ushiwaka responded with curt answers and vague responses. Not because he felt uncomfortable talking about it, but because he’d learned a long time ago to be concise, cut out the fluff. Sitting in the car, elbow against the window, Tooru watched him with both hands on the wheel and face forward. He was a bit rough around the edges. But Tooru was good at smoothing out rough edges. And it wouldn’t be hard—it was like Ushiwaka’s edges had been waiting for a long time to be smoothed.

Like a gentleman, doing it right, Ushiwaka parked his car in a little garage and wouldn’t let Tooru open the door himself. He had to sit, hands in his lap, as Ushiwaka walked all the way around to open the door and hold his hand to let him out.

“You’re so much,” Tooru laughed. A pot calling the kettle black. He liked it and he indulged in it and he wouldn’t want it to be any other way.

Ushiwaka lived in a well-sized apartment (a little bigger than Hajime’s) whose cleanliness inspired Tooru when he walked inside. It practically glistened. The walls were white, decorated sparingly. A painting of a bouquet, a picture of Ushiwaka and his family. As soon as he stepped inside he saw a cupboard for shoes, a coat hanger, smelled fresh cherry blossoms and chicken. Bright, unfiltered light from the ceiling poured over the dustless apartment. Nice leather furniture spread out across the living room, shimmering marble tiles in the kitchen, a wooden dining table with a beautiful red cloth and candles in the center. Tooru let out a breath when he saw it all.

“Wow. Nice place,” he heard himself say.

“I know it’s not as big as yours, but—”

“Shut up. It’s great and you know it.”

Ushiwaka opened his mouth to respond, but Tooru shut him up with a flicker of his wrist. So, silent and blushing, Ushiwaka led Tooru to the dining table, pulled out a chair, and then pushed it in for him. But he didn’t leave quite yet. Maybe he couldn’t help himself—maybe he was overstepping bounds that he’d set for himself. He put his hands on Tooru’s shoulders and squeezed, just enough that Tooru was wild from the pressure. Tooru put one of his hands atop Ushiwaka’s. His skin was so calloused, but warm and welcoming.

“I hope you’re comfortable here,” Ushiwaka said.

“Mm.”

Ushiwaka leaned down and put his lips to Tooru’s temple, the way an old man might kiss his lover. His lips were sweet, soft, but there was a boiling moment of desperation in their puckered shape. Tooru closed his eyes to feel it better, but it was gone in the next instant, and so was Ushiwaka.

He took chicken out of the oven, mixed the salad, poured two glasses of wine (Satori had helped him choose), and lit the candles on the table. Then he sat down across from Tooru and told him to dig in.

“You were right. You cook pretty well,” Tooru said, halfway through his plate.

“I cooked for my mother a lot,” he admitted.

“Did she teach you?”

“No. I taught myself.”

Tooru took a sip of his wine and, though he was silent, kept his eyes on Ushiwaka’s.

“You’re a much better cook than I am,” he said.

“You always have other things to worry about.”

“Had.”

They fell silent again. The flames flickered lightly between them. For a moment, Tooru expected Gemini to come begging for food, until he realized that Gemini wasn’t here.

“Ushiwaka-chan,” Tooru began. Ushiwaka’s gaze shifted up. “What’s the first thing you see when you look at me?”

“Your eyes.”

“So cliché,” he snickered.

“Perhaps. But I’m not an original person to begin with.”

“The first thing I see is the hardness in your face,” Tooru said.

“The hardness?”

“Not in a negative way. But you always look very serious.”

“I...” Ushiwaka appeared perplexed, his eyebrows knitting together. “I’m not sure how to change that.”

“Don’t. Nobody’s asking you to. It’s just part of you.” Tooru grinned and took another sip, while Ushiwaka squirmed beneath his watch. “All right, what about when you think of me? Conjure me up in your head? What’s the first thing you see?”

“Music.”

“You can’t see music.”

“You of all people should know that you can,” Ushiwaka insisted. Tooru blinked at him for a moment. Taken aback.

“How do you see it?”

“Spreading out like bird wings. Or...no, like you’re weaving a tapestry for me to look at. With images on it embroidered so finely.”

Tooru hadn’t been expecting tears to pop to his eyes at such a classic thing to say. It wasn’t like nobody had said something like that to him before. But it struck him this time. He desperately drank more wine and blinked them away.

“I’m sorry. Did I say something I shouldn’t have?”

Tooru shook his head.

“What about me?” Ushiwaka continued.

Tooru had to think before he answered, because there was no way for him to say, “Hajime’s partner.” It wouldn’t have been fair. So he lied.

“I don’t think I know you well enough yet.”

“There must be something.”

“The rose you gave me. And your garden. I want to see it.”

“It’s not here,” Ushiwaka sighed. “It’s in my family home.”

“Oh. I guess that makes sense.”

“But...I would love to show it to you.”

Tooru had no response. Nothing he could possibly say. So he smiled, the way he’d been taught, and he saw Ushiwaka crumble in the light of that smile and knew that his silence was fine.

They ate the rest of their dinner alternating between comfortable silence and graceful conversation. They were simple, they didn’t talk about anything controversial or dramatic, and the words and topics flowed from their lips like honey. Tooru tried to imprint Ushiwaka’s mannerisms, so that they could replace Hajime’s in some twisted way, but instead he just crammed them together. It took him a bit to remember that Ushiwaka’s dominant hand was his left. He chewed his food quietly, smoothly, lips pressed tightly together and eyes downcast. Every few moments, it seemed that he would become conscious of the furrow of his brows, and he would let out an exhale to relax the muscles of his face. But, inevitably, the furrow would return, and Tooru considered reminding him about the threat of wrinkles. Ushiwaka was quite beautiful. Tooru couldn’t deny that, though his heart beat soundly and evenly, his skin became hot and prickly if he stared at Ushiwaka for too long. He supplemented it with the wine—good, vintage red.

“Did you know that Iwa-chan doesn’t like to drink wine?” he said.

“He prefers whiskey.”

After dinner, Ushiwaka offered another glass of wine, and then they moved to the couch. In the corner was a nice little stereo. Wine glass in his left hand, Ushiwaka walked over to it, his body careening like a boat on a soft ocean with each step.

“What would you like to listen to, Oikawa?”

“Whatever’s already in there.”

Ushiwaka pressed play, and _Carmen_ began to play.

“You like opera?” Tooru smirked.

“I do.”

“I played a piano arrangement for _Carmen_ once.”

“Did you?”

Ushiwaka sat down, leaving space between them, on the same couch. Tooru’s eyes were drawn to his hand resting gently on the padding, his palm fitting neatly against the fabric, and suddenly he imagined that it was his thigh that Ushiwaka was caressing. The heat spread faster and more dramatically across his body as he thought of Ushiwaka’s lips, pressing against the edge of that glass, pressed instead to the skin of his arched neck. His tongue, lapping up the blood-red wine, digging into the crevices of his spine. His body pushing him down into the couch until he disappeared there, breathless, sacrificial.

Ushiwaka turned and met his eyes, and Tooru found that he couldn’t hold his gaze. He snapped his head away and stared at the painting of the flowers in front of him.

“Oikawa, can I say something a bit direct?”

“You don’t have any other way of speaking.”

“You’re breathtaking.”

Tooru smiled, held in a laugh, felt that his cheeks were as red as his fingers. He put his half-finished glass of wine on the nearest coffee table.

“That is direct.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“You can stop apologizing.”

“Did you enjoy dinner?”

“You’re a really great cook. Thank you for inviting me.”

“No. Thank you for accepting my invitation.”

Tooru (though he couldn’t tell if it was willingly or unwillingly) inched closer on the couch, closer, until the side of his hand brushed the side of Ushiwaka’s. And like nervous children, their pinkies interlocked. Tooru was starting to lose control of himself, starting to lose his inhibitions and his restraints. Any chains around his body were falling, leaving him limp and desperate. He turned so that he was facing Ushiwaka, so he could look into his face unobscured.

When Ushiwaka turned to meet his eyes, Tooru could see the breath leaving his parted lips. He was the reason, wasn’t he? He was the thief, the one stealing the breaths straight from Ushiwaka’s lungs and throwing them into the air, discarding them. In his hands he felt power and authority and lust. In a daze, hasty, Ushiwaka stumbled to put his glass down. Then suddenly slow again, he lifted a hand to brush Tooru’s cheek, as if he were running his fingers along the edges of a just-finished painting. As soon as his palm pressed to Tooru’s cheek, Tooru’s eyes fluttered closed. He opened his lips and inched forward.

“I’m so afraid,” he heard Ushiwaka murmur.

“Afraid? Why?”

“Because I don’t understand you. Or myself.”

“You don’t have to understand.”

“Don’t I?”

“No.”

“I’m afraid that if I kiss you right now, you’ll slip away.”

“I won’t go anywhere.”

Ushiwaka lifted his other hand so he could hold Tooru’s face, brush both his cheeks. Quick, nervous breaths fell upon Tooru’s lips. But he was patient. He sat still. Sat beautiful. Sat quiet, until he felt the edges of Ushiwaka’s lips, digging further until they crushed his. They were so warm, too. The kiss lasted only for a moment and tasted like purity. When Tooru opened his eyes, to see the expression on Ushiwaka’s face, he was perplexed. Ushiwaka’s eyes were downcast, his breathing choppy and his body heaving.

“U...Ushiwaka-chan...”

At the sound of his name, his head bobbed back up, and he pressed his palms more firmly to Tooru’s cheeks.

“I’m sorry. I just don’t know what to do.”

His lips trembled and Tooru’s heart broke.

“Kiss me again.”

As Ushiwaka, a slave to Tooru’s every word, obeyed, Tooru felt the weight of Ushiwaka’s entire soul resting upon his shoulders. He reached up and wrapped his fingers around Ushiwaka’s wrists and drew him in. Kissed him hard, soft, sweet and bitter. Could feel that Ushiwaka’s body, hands, lips, were trembling. Tooru parted his lips further, until through instinct Ushiwaka snaked his tongue between them. As their lips interlocked, their tongues twisted together, their breathing heavy and ragged, Tooru sat back against the couch, pulling Ushiwaka toward him. But his back fell against the couch and Ushiwaka, like waking from a trance, pulled away. Stood up. Ran his sweating hand across his face.

“S-sorry,” he mumbled. Tooru sat back up. His heart was racing and his limbs felt heavy with raw desire.

“Sorry...?”

“I don’t want to go too fast.”

“What are you, fifteen?”

Ushiwaka stared at him, frozen for a moment.

“I’m…”

“I know, I know you’re sorry,” Tooru sighed. “I know.”

Ushiwaka’s eyes darted around the room, uncertain and afraid. Looking for something, anything, to help him navigate this new world upon which he’d stumbled.

“I don’t want to ruin it. I’m nervous.”

Tooru watched him, unmoved.

“All right. If you’re so nervous, I’ll leave.”

He stood up, very much aware of Ushiwaka’s anxious stare following his every move.

“W-wait—”

“I don’t want to make you uncomfortable in your own home.”

He gathered his things and moved toward the door. But, as he was about to put his shoes on, he felt a vice grip on his wrist and whirled around. There was Ushiwaka. The expression of a nervous, trying-to-stay-strong child on his face.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “I’m sorry, Oikawa. If you...if you want to stay the night. Please. Stay the night.”

“Why is it just about what I want?” he demanded angrily.

Ushiwaka looked genuinely surprised at the question. And then he answered as if it were the most obvious, natural thing in the world.

“Because that’s all I care about.”


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

“And then he tells me—you’ll get a laugh out of this, Mattsun—he tells me that he doesn’t wanna go too fast. That he wants to do it ‘right,’ whatever the hell that means.”

Issei, predictably, laughed and took a swig from his beer. Beside him, Takahiro stared blankly, invested and certainly very entertained by Tooru’s story. They were sitting at the bar of the Black Cat, and while Tooru told them of his woes, Kuroo mixed him another drink and chuckled to himself. Tooru glanced over at him and wondered where his cute little friend was, the one who liked to hear Tooru play piano and drink from bottles of Coke. He hadn’t seen him around in a while.

“So that’s it? You just left?”

“What else was I supposed to do? Pour him a glass of milk and sing him to sleep?”

“Can you do that for me?” Issei asked.

“I’m trying to be serious! He makes me feel like I’m in high school again.”

“Oh, that’s right, cuz everyone was falling all over you in high school,” Takahiro said.

“I hate you so much, you know?”

“What do you think, Kuroo?” Tooru said, turning to his last resort. Kuroo smoothly poured a drink and shrugged.

“I dunno. Seems like the poor guy likes you a lot. To the point that he has no clue what to do,” he snickered.

“Don’t inflate his ego,” Takahiro mumbled.

“I think you should give him a chance. He could be the real deal.” Kuroo handed him his drink and crossed his arms in that languid, graceful way of his.  

“What does that even mean?” Tooru hissed.

“Think of it like this: how often do you get someone in your life who wants to make you happy for no other reason than to make you happy?”

Tooru was thinking about Hajime now, because that was how he felt about him. Even when Hajime used to call him names, hit him, tease him, Tooru had always just wanted him to be happy. It was a painful thing to want.

“Not often,” he finally admitted.

“I mean, I’m not saying this guy is like that,” Kuroo continued, “but he could be.”

Tooru could see why Kuroo would say that. He wasn’t wrong—Ushiwaka could be that person, desperate to put himself in harm’s way to make Tooru happy. Maybe, if Tooru gave Ushiwaka the chance, he would set himself on fire just to keep Tooru from getting cold. The thought made him smile and hate himself. Issei and Takahiro recognized the expression on his face. They both raised their eyebrows.

“Hold on there, Casanova. If you don’t actually like the guy, let it go,” Takahiro said. “Don’t date him just because he makes you feel like a princess.”

“I am a princess.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I don’t know, I feel like Oikawa’s just naturally a douche, so—”

“Mattsun! Stop! Iwa-chan’s meanness is rubbing off on you.”       

“Iwa-chan,” Kuroo repeated with a snort.

“What can I say? He’s a good judge of character,” Takahiro replied with a mean-spirited grin. Tooru dismissed their jaunts with a flick of his wrist, turning away to stare emptily into his martini. Kuroo made great martinis.

“So I should give him another chance,” he said absentmindedly.

“I think so. Hey, Tsukki, we want your advice,” Kuroo called.

“No, fuck off.”

Kuroo chuckled to himself and threw a wink in the blonde waiter’s direction.

“Also, you should think about what role you had in whatever shit-show that was,” Kuroo added. He was staring at Tooru beneath heavy lids, the way a parent might stare a child hiding a secret.   

“Me?!”

“Yes, you, baby boy. Ever try to see it from his perspective? At all? Ever?”

Tooru blinked at him. Silent.

“That’s what I thought. Just take a deep breath and look at the big picture, all right? Try to be a bit considerate.”

“I’m plenty considerate.”

“Yeah, all right. Another drink?”

“Please.”

 

* * *

 

Tooru took Kuroo’s advice (he was so confident and seemed to always know what he was talking about) and gave Ushiwaka another chance. It wasn’t a hard thing to do—in retrospect, he felt guilty for how he had treated earnest, sincere Wakatoshi Ushijima. Who’d been apologizing persistently for his “unacceptable behavior” which had, in fact, been very acceptable. Just not to someone petty and selfish like Tooru Oikawa.

He asked Ushiwaka to take him dancing at a club or something. Ushiwaka, in relief, admitted that he had never done anything like that, but could easily get club recommendations from Satori. That was how Tooru found himself at a table in a dark, loud nightclub, drunk, his body close to Ushiwaka’s and his hand in his. They’d been talking for hours and had fallen into a lull, Ushiwaka not drunk at all. Because he had to drive, he said.

Tooru had been drunk for hours at that point and was bored with stillness. His body ached for movement, so he stood up from the table, his hand slipping out of Ushiwaka’s. With a tender smile, a coy, shrewd smile, he moved to the dance floor. Among the millions of bodies that twisted and turned there. Keeping his eyes on Ushiwaka’s, he began to dance. His hips swayed, his arms flowing up and down like a star and his eyelids heavy. His shoulders bounced in uneven motions, his fingers were curled and his smile was unbalanced—crooked and genuine. Even though his head was hurting and his sight was blurry, he let his body move to the music and never moved his gaze from Ushiwaka. The music pulled his limbs as if he were a puppet, bending and twisting like a snake reacting to the charmer’s tune. He knew Ushiwaka—he knew that, by this point, everybody—was watching him and it made his body even more graceful. His neck bent to the side, until his cheek was nearly resting on his shoulder, and the languid shifts of his hips became sensual and inviting. The music pulled him, pushed him, moved him in ways he never thought possible and drove him to numb insanity. He couldn’t help but smile. Child-like. Authentic.

He reached one of his hands out toward Ushiwaka and beckoned for him. With a raise of his eyebrows and the bend of his fingers. The sway of his hips. Expression unchanging, Ushiwaka stood and walked onto the dance floor. He grabbed Tooru’s outstretched hand and squeezed it until it felt dry. Brought it to his lips and kissed it—it was sweet, but Tooru wasn’t in the mood for it. He was drunk and wanted to dance and rub his body against someone else’s. As Ushiwaka stepped toward him, Tooru turned and pressed his back to Ushiwaka’s chest, forcing his arms around him. Ushiwaka’s body felt stiff and nervous and clammy, but warm. Tooru couldn’t help but lean against him, feel the curve of his broad shoulder against the back of his neck as it arched backward.

As he moved, swayed, drew shapes with his hips, Ushiwaka’s body loosened. He brought his face forward until his lips were at Tooru’s ear and he breathed out, letting his hands ride up onto Tooru’s waist. His movements weren’t graceful, or natural, by any means—no, Ushiwaka was moving purely by instinct. His palms were covered in sweat and the soles of his feet were absolutely flat against the tiles. But still, Tooru could feel the desperation and the earnestness in his movements. So he pressed his hips against Ushiwaka’s body and reached his hands back, until they were digging into Ushiwaka’s thighs. Arched his neck back even further, until their cheeks were rubbing and their breaths mingling. As Tooru moved, swayed, pressed, Ushiwaka’s movements became more relaxed. He started to move his hands along the edges, the curves, of Tooru’s body; he kissed the corner of his lips and slid his fingers beneath the hem of his shirt. Pushed his hips forward to meet Tooru’s, squeezed his torso, let his tongue leave his mouth to meet Tooru’s salty skin.

They became one and the same, Tooru moving and Ushiwaka following his movements as best he could. He let his body take control and his lust lead him. Fingers gripping skin, slipping beneath the edges of Tooru’s pants, teasing him, thrusting his hips and breathing, gravelly, into his ear. Tooru had never felt so hot in his life; his body was burning and his soul was sobbing (he wasn’t quite sure why). His skin felt prickly, his lips dry, his tongue too still for comfort. Strength left him in flurries and he had to lean back against Ushiwaka’s sturdy body to keep himself up on his feet. And Ushiwaka supported him. Kissed his bent neck, hugged his body, pulled him more tightly against him.

“You’re a horrible dancer,” Tooru murmured. Reaching up to brush Ushiwaka’s lips with the tips of his tingling fingers.

“I know.”

Tooru was grinding on him now, with a body suddenly like water and breaths ragged. In his drunkenness his movements were fluid and wild. But Ushiwaka steadied him. His heat calmed him. Soothed him and made him dizzy with lust.

“Loosen up,” he murmured into Ushiwaka’s jaw-line. At the corner of his lips. “I don’t bite. Not unless you want me to.”

The lights were dim and the music was loud and Tooru was losing himself in the feeling of being touched. And he realized rather quickly (whether it was in spite of being drunk or because of being drunk he wasn’t really sure) that if he closed his eyes, he could imagine that it was Hajime touching him. Hajime’s body he was pressed to. Hajime’s hands gripping his legs and teasing the edges of his pants, Hajime’s fingers tracing the bare skin of his chest and stomach. Hajime’s hips pushing up against him, Hajime’s breath gravelly and sensual in his ear, the edges of Hajime’s lips sticking to his sweating cheeks.

It was so unfair of him.

He wasn’t sure how long they danced like that or how they were able to push through the dull, numbing ache of desire that took over their bodies for so long. But eventually, the haziness got the better of him, and Tooru stumbled, nearly falling headfirst into the throng of people. His head ached from the music, the bass, and though his mind wasn’t tired his body had danced until fatigue overpowered it. As he stumbled, he felt Hajime’s—no, no, wait, it was Ushiwaka, wasn’t it?—he felt Ushiwaka’s strong, steady arm holding him up by the waist. He laughed out loud in embarrassment and put an arm around Ushiwaka’s shoulder.

“I’m just a mess, aren’t I?” he cooed. Ushiwaka held him with no effort.

“A bit.” His face was red and Tooru could tell, could feel, that his heart was pounding. So he took advantage of it and leaned more of his weight. Put his lips right up against Ushiwaka’s ear.

“I don’t think I can get myself home,” he murmured.

“No. You definitely can’t.”

“I don’t even think I can walk without your help.”

Ushiwaka was silent, watching Tooru from the corner of his eye as he led him from the dance floor. Ushiwaka was far from stupid. He was oblivious sometimes, awkward when it came to social interactions, but he was intelligent. Certainly intelligent enough to know just what Tooru was doing—intelligent enough to realize that enough time had passed. He wasn’t really that drunk anymore.

When they were outside and the fresh air washed over them, the hints of nausea that Tooru had been feeling disappeared, and he was able to stand on his feet. But he kept his arm interlocked with Ushiwaka’s. Space between them would have been too deep and cold.

“Would you drive me home, Mr. Handsome Detective?” he said.

“Of course.”

He wanted to see Ushiwaka smile, but something was bothering him. Ushiwaka was neither tactful nor mysterious, and Tooru was almost inhumanly observant. But he didn’t say anything. He kept his lips closed, in a tight coquettish smile, while he let Ushiwaka lead him to his car parked about a block away. As soon as they were in the car, Tooru put his window down and leaned his elbow against the door. But Ushiwaka didn’t start the car right away. They sat in the dark, late-night silence for a bit. Tooru resisted the urge to look over at Ushiwaka, because he didn’t want to know what kind of expression he would find there.

“Oikawa,” Ushiwaka began. Voice steady despite the uncertainty that Tooru could just _feel_.

“Hm?”

“I want to ask you a serious question before I take you home.”

“When have you ever asked anything _not_ serious, Ushiwaka-chan?”

He didn’t respond. Tooru became acutely aware of his meanness in that moment of silence.

“But your answers aren’t always serious,” he finally said. Tooru couldn’t help but laugh.

“You’re not wrong. Well, go ahead, U-shi-wa-ka-chaaan~.”

Moonlight Sonata pounded in his brain, but he wished it were Piano Man. Or, at the very least, the trashy music he’d been dancing to a little bit ago.

“I’ve been trying to think of the right words for a long time, and I can’t seem to find them,” Ushiwaka began. Tooru finally let his eyes wander over to him. He was staring, steely, at his own hands, wrapped tightly around the steering wheel. Even though he wasn’t driving.

“You’re always concerned with doing things ‘right.’ But that’s so ambiguous and meaningless, don’t you think?”

“I disagree.” There was no hesitation in his answer.

“Hmph.”

“I thought of maybe waiting a bit longer to ask you this. But, dancing in there with you...I don’t think I can.”

Tooru watched. Waited, expectant. He wanted to hum but figured it wasn’t a good time.

“I like you. I like you a lot. More than I’ve ever like anybody,” he continued, voice somehow soft. “I want to keep spending time with you. I—”

“You always talk as if you’re a high schooler giving a confession,” Tooru interrupted. Ushiwaka didn’t look over at him. Still stared at the steering wheel.

“I don’t know how else to do it.”

Tooru pursed his lips and waited for him to continue.

Finally, Ushiwaka looked up at him. And when he did, there was such ferocity in his eyes that Tooru shriveled. Withered. Burned in them. He reached over decisively and grabbed Tooru’s hand. Kissed it with fervent lips.

“Through all the years I spent poring over your music, I never dreamed that I would ever meet you, let alone...”

Tooru was speechless.

“...I was afraid to talk to you about this because it’s only our third date. And we hardly know each other, but—”

“I don’t think that’s true. You don’t need to know someone for a long time to _know_ them.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

“Not maybe. I _am_ right.”

“Then it’ll be easier to tell you,” he said, with a deep breath. He never let go of Tooru’s hand. “I want to fall in love with you. I want to devote myself to you. Will you let me?”

Tooru had known it was coming, but he hadn’t quite expected it to be like that.

“Y-you talk about relationships like, like you’re a slave,” he stuttered.

“Because I can’t dictate to you how to feel. I can only talk about my own feelings.”

“Are you saying you want to be exclusive?”

“And serious. I know it’s soon, I—”

“Don’t apologize, Ushiwaka-chan.”

Tooru couldn’t keep the tenderness from sneaking into his voice. Not when Ushiwaka was holding his hand like that, afraid to let go. Gazing up at him with shimmering eyes, fierce with devotion and sacrifice and pure, innocent desire. Not moving a single muscle, perhaps for fear that he would ruin everything with a single wrong gesture. Tooru leaned toward him, paused, and then kissed his lips gently.

“Okay. You win. I’m yours.”

Ushiwaka leaned forward to steal another kiss. Tooru let him.

“But I don’t like speaking as if I possess you,” he clarified, voice low. “I don’t want our relationship to be like that.”

“You don’t have to explain everything. You’re over-thinking this.”       

Tooru was so charmed, he could feel his heart breaking to jagged pieces in his chest. His hand came up to touch Ushiwaka’s cheek. He kissed his lips again. He was moved by Ushiwaka’s dedication, Ushiwaka’s genuine affection. Not enough to steal his heart—there was nothing strong enough for that—but enough to move him, even a little bit, to entertain the idea that he could be happy with this man who wanted so desperately to make him so.

“Will you take me home now, Ushiwaka-chan?”

Ushiwaka nodded and turned the car on. Then they drove back to Jiyuugaoka.

This time, when Tooru invited Ushiwaka to come inside, he did. Closing the door behind him. Letting out a deep breath. While Tooru led him by the hand into his home. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in case you were wondering i was very drunk when i wrote the club scene. 
> 
> do with that what you will.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

Tooru kept the lights dim and heard himself offer to make tea, without even considering actually making it. He didn’t feel as if he were in his home, in this world, even in this dimension. He forced everything out of his mind except for the feeling of Ushiwaka’s hand in his, because if he let anything else slip through the house of cards he had concocted would crumble in an instant. Ushiwaka followed, eyes never leaving Tooru. He didn’t even give Ushiwaka a chance to take his jacket off before he led him toward the stairs, climbed up dazily, and stumbled into his room (asked if Ushiwaka wanted tea? did Ushiwaka say no?). He stood at the edge of his bed with his arms at his side, watching, waiting, as Ushiwaka gently closed the door behind him. His hand moved toward the light switch.

“No,” Tooru said, “don’t turn the lights on.”

Ushiwaka lowered his hand obediently. Tooru stared at him for a few moments, their eyes adjusting to the darkness. There must have been something glistening there in Tooru’s eyes, something beckoning, because Ushiwaka walked over to him and cupped his face in his hands. Softly, delicately, as if with his large hands he was handling something precious and fragile. In the darkness, Tooru could see the shadows playing on Ushiwaka’s sharp face, lighting up his eyes. His fingers at the corners of Tooru’s eyes, his thumbs stroking his cheeks, were like velvet. Satin. Felt like Chopin in a concert hall, Beethoven out on the veranda.

“If you kiss me and leave, I won’t forgive you,” Tooru whispered.

“Never again.”

When Ushiwaka kissed him, and Tooru’s eyes fluttered closed like butterfly wings, his body became prickly and languid. Ushiwaka’s grip tightened as he fell further into the kiss, forcing Tooru’s neck to arch slightly back. Tooru couldn’t help, then, grasping with his trembling red fingers the front of Ushiwaka’s shirt and pulling him closer. His mind had lost all capacity to think, his heart frozen and still—it was his body now. His body and his dried up soul. Kissing and being kissed by someone with calloused palms, soft lips and a tongue that tasted of wheat. Tooru opened his mouth so that he could be kissed harder and deeper, so that Ushiwaka would push himself. As Ushiwaka’s thick tongue slid smoothly into Tooru’s mouth, he pushed him back, gently, until they were sitting on the edge of the bed. Tooru’s hands moved of their own accord—down to the hem of Ushiwaka’s shirt, his undershirt, then up against his bare skin. It was hot. Tooru almost withdrew his hands for fear that he would burn them. But then his palms felt comfort and he dug them deeper.

Next thing he knew, he had taken Ushiwaka’s shirt off and wrapped his legs around his waist, arms propped up on his shoulders. He wrapped a slender, shaking arm around the back of Ushiwaka’s neck and dug his nails into his shoulder blade. Pressed his hips down against Ushiwaka’s crotch. Their lips parted and Ushiwaka let out a long, low sigh, lips glistening. He buried his head in Tooru’s neck and kissed it. Tooru felt that he could let his entire body go limp and Ushiwaka would support him, steady him. Ushiwaka’s hands smoothly, softly caressed his body and his tongue was slow and wet on his neck. Tooru’s body shuddered, swerved in a pleased and involuntary response. He wanted to whisper dirty things in Ushiwaka’s ear, wanted to see his face turn red and hear the shattering beat of his telltale heart. One hand still gripping his back, Tooru brought his other hand up and ran his fingers through Ushiwaka’s hair. Cropped short, bristly. He wanted Ushiwaka to never stop kissing his neck.

“Mm,” Tooru sighed, arching his neck back to give Ushiwaka’s tongue more space. He swiped it up beneath his chin, then kissed his jaw. The corner of his mouth. His upper lip, his lower lip. While his hands continued to caress and make Tooru’s skin crawl in bliss.

Tooru kissed him back and he imagined that his lips tasted like lust. His hand started to trace Ushiwaka’s muscles—maybe they were like Hajime’s.

“It’s not fair,” Tooru murmured into Ushiwaka’s part lips.

“Hmm? What’s not fair?”

His deep voice, reverberating smoothly against Tooru’s neck, made him shudder again.

“Your muscles.”

“They’re not for show. I need them.”

“Mhmm, to take out the bad guys, right?”

Ushiwaka pulled back so he could stare up into Tooru’s heavy-lidded, drowsy face. Tooru smiled ever so slightly. He could see Ushiwaka’s eyes glued to his lips. He licked them.

“Right,” he replied. His face bent up to kiss Tooru again, his arms bringing him closer, holding him more tightly. One hand slid to the back of his neck, spreading his fingers out, and the other ran down his leg and grabbed his ass. Tooru fell against him hard, desperate, wanting to feel the pressure of another body on his. Sucking the air out, making him cry out in heavy moans and incoherent excitement. Ushiwaka put his palm tenderly against the small of Tooru’s back and led him down onto the bed, settling between his hips.

Tooru let his body sink into the bed and spread his arms out against the sheets. Ushiwaka’s lips touched his forehead and his hands ran along the length of Tooru’s arms, and finally interlocked their fingers. He pushed his hips down into Tooru’s, squeezed his fingers harder when Tooru moaned against his neck.

Ushiwaka was unfairly gentle. The way his hands traversed Tooru’s body, making him sigh and arch his back and smile in spite of himself. The way his lips left Tooru’s skin tingling where they touched, left his skin tingling and warm. The way his tongue smoothed him out and made him see stars—the whiteness that spread from his crotch to the very tips of his fingers. The way his voice, so low, so deep, tenderly sighed into his ear and his lips and his pink neck.

And suddenly Tooru was eighteen years old again, twisting and turning and writhing on Hajime’s bed to the tune of his fingers. He closed his eyes and he was back there, moans spilling from his lips as he thought of Hajime’s hands on his waist, Hajime’s lips crushing his, Hajime’s hips swerving, melding into his.

But he opened his eyes and it was Ushiwaka—sweet, earnest, loving Wakatoshi Ushijima—kissing him. Caressing him. Whispering into his ear that Tooru was beautiful and that he felt like the luckiest man in the world. It wasn’t Hajime. It would never be Hajime. The idea made Tooru’s fingers grasp at the sheets and nearly rip them. He was afraid to touch Ushiwaka because his nails would draw blood. Ushiwaka was sweeter and gentler than Hajime was. Tooru could remember so well how Hajime had been with him. He’d replayed that night in his head every day for six years, had recorded it in excruciating detail in his notebook, had dreamt about it and touched himself to the thought of it. And Ushiwaka was different. Softer, slower, gentler. His kisses tasted different and when Tooru moaned it sounded different.

“Ushi— _mmf—_ Ushiwaka. I... _ahh_ ,” he began, his words interrupted again and again by the involuntary moans pouring from his open lips. Ushiwaka touched his cheeks and kissed his lips. Hard and soft at the same time—Tooru tasted moonlight.

“What is it?” he murmured. Kissed his forehead.

“I...want to taste you,” he said.

The reality was that he needed a way to be with _Ushiwaka_.

“You want to...?”

Tooru propped himself up onto his elbows, forcing Ushiwaka up. His fingers traced Ushiwaka’s lips, eyebrows, ears. Then moved down to his belt.

“Lean back.”

Surprise (unwarranted) on his face, Ushiwaka did as he was told. He spread his legs out  and leaned back onto his forearms. Tooru finished taking off his belt, tossing it from the bed, and couldn’t help but pause to press his palms to Ushiwaka’s sweating abdomen. He leaned forward to kiss the center of his chest while he unbuttoned Ushiwaka’s pants and forced them down his thick legs.

“Oika—”

“Shut up and let me do this, will you?”

Ushiwaka shut his mouth.

Tooru had never done this for Hajime. How many times had he imagined doing it in his horny, deprived, sexually repressed adolescence? But he’d never gotten the chance. Maybe this would help him see, feel, taste something other than Hajime when it was Ushiwaka touching him. So he pulled down Ushiwaka’s boxers to reveal his penis, hard and unexpectedly (no, that was a lie, Tooru had been expecting this) large. He wrapped his hand around it gently and used his wrist to push it back toward Ushiwaka’s stomach and slide his palm up. Almost instantly it had the intended effect; Ushiwaka’s eyes closed and his body quivered with a heavy sigh. While his eyes were closed, Tooru grinned, and brought his lips to the tip. When they made contact, Ushiwaka breathed out again and his fingers gripped the sheets. Tooru was amused. He’d barely done anything and already Ushiwaka was this worked up.

He took in more of it, his tongue wrapped around and around and around. Just to tease him, he took his lips back up to the tip, lifted his eyes to catch a glimpse of Ushiwaka’s slack features.

“Are you enjoying this, Ushiwaka-chan?” he taunted. Ushiwaka forced his eyes open.

“Do you need me to answer?”

With a low laugh, Tooru took Ushiwaka’s cock back into his mouth. All the way this time, until Tooru felt that he was going to vomit and he had to bob back up. In the midst of pushing down, bobbing up, wrapping his tongue and pumping with his hand, he was vaguely aware of Ushiwaka speaking to him. “Don’t do anything that’s unco— _mm—_ uncomfortable for you.”

He ignored him and kept going, faster and harder and deeper, until with his other hand on Ushiwaka’s chest he could feel his erratic breaths. His irregular heartbeat. Could hear with such clarity the deep growls from his lips. He moved until his mouth was filled and he could taste something salty, bitter, until his eyes began to water and the corners of his mouth ached. He heard himself moaning, saw white when he closed his eyes.

He took Ushiwaka right to the edge before he stopped, saliva dripping from his mouth and breaths ragged. Glancing up, he saw Ushiwaka’s red, flushed face, and he smiled. He wasn’t sure what kind of face Hajime would have made. How Hajime would have tasted. And he felt blinding rage when he realized that Michiko probably did know. She’d probably made his entire body red from her lipstick.

To drive her away from his thoughts, Tooru gently grabbed Ushiwaka’s hands and lay down on his back on the bed. Ushiwaka, still trying to catch his breath, followed his lead and kissed his lips. He could feel the wet tip of his cock against his stomach and he was getting dizzy with desire—his stomach was aching. Ushiwaka kissed his neck and brought his lips to his ear.

“Can I make love to you, Oikawa?”

Tooru could do nothing but nod.

The pleasure was blinding, unbearable, the rhythms steady and deafening. Ushiwaka was still gentle, body expertly fitting against Tooru’s, making him spin from the white, hot and cold and everything-in-between pleasure. The sheets became covered in their sweat and the ceiling marked with their outcries and breaths. Tooru hadn’t known that he was even capable of moaning like this, didn’t know his body could writhe like this, didn’t know his thoughts could become so jumbled and incoherent from the feeling of being touched, kissed, loved. Ushiwaka fucked him until his body was bursting and his open lips quivering, begging for more and receiving all that for which he asked. Ushiwaka was generous, patient, considerate.

“Am I hurting you?” he murmured, and Tooru wanted to smack him because he so clearly wasn’t in pain. He had to remind himself that Ushiwaka was terrible at reading people.

They finished and they were exhausted, dizzy from the highs that they’d reached together. Tooru could hardly keep his eyes open, but wasn’t sure if he’d be able to sleep with this tingling sensation running over his body. Like when he finished a concert and stood up take a bow, and everybody was already standing and clapping and smiling up at him with eyes watering. That feeling of sitting on a cloud.

Ushiwaka grabbed replacement sheets from the closet, where Tooru directed him, and they burrowed together beneath the sheets. Tooru could feel himself falling asleep before his body had even gotten comfortable, his back pressed to Ushiwaka’s chest and his hand encased in his. As he drifted, he felt Ushiwaka’s lips sleepily kiss the back of his neck, felt his thick eyelashes buried in his hair. He was playing with Tooru’s fingers and holding him so close and Tooru’s heart was in pain for him.

He fell asleep and, in that strange dimension between wakefulness and sleep, it really was Hajime there holding him.

 

* * *

 

When Tooru woke up, hearing Mozart, the sun had barely started to rise and he was shivering. A fever had crept up on him in the middle of the night and he was covered in sweat, bones aching from the shivers. Sometime in their slumber Ushiwaka had drifted away from him and was asleep on the other side of the bed. Tooru needed to wake him up, so he dug inside himself for the strength.

In that silent moment before he shook Ushiwaka to wake him, he saw Ushiwaka’s sleeping face. The curl of his dark shoulder lighting up in front of the window, where the light from the rising sun was starting to slip in. The constant furrow in his brows was gone, his face tranquil and innocent and gentle. Tooru blinked, taken aback. Ushiwaka was beautiful, and he hadn’t quite been expecting to feel that so deeply. His breaths fell softly against the pillow and his hair, usually so well brushed, was messy and matted on one side. Tooru closed his eyes for a few moments before he managed to grab his shoulder and shake it.

“Ushhhiwwwaka,” he murmured, speech slurred from his chattering teeth. Ushiwaka opened his eyes slowly, his expression unchanging.

Light returned to them when his gaze fell upon Tooru beside him in bed. Still groggy, he reached over and grabbed Tooru’s hand. Kissed it.     

“Usshh...”

His voice trailed off and Ushiwaka seemed to finally _see_ him. He brought his head up pressed the back of his hand to Tooru’s forehead.

“You’re burning up.”

“No sh-ssshit.”

Ushiwaka ran his hands through Tooru’s hair for a moment, then brought the blankets up to cover Tooru’s body—they’d slipped down off his shoulders during the night. He got out of bed, wearing nothing but his boxer briefs.

“Wh-where are you gggoing?” Tooru asked weakly.

“I’m going to get you something to eat and a towel to help cool you down.”

“I can’t b-b-bear to eat anything.”

“Just a few crackers if you have to—so you can take your medicine.”

“Don’t be long.”

“I won’t. I promise.”

Ushiwaka disappeared for a little bit, leaving Tooru shaking and burning in his bed. He couldn’t move. He could hardly breathe. And his fingers hurt like hell. Finally, Ushiwaka came back with a tray, a bowl of cereal, a glass of water, a vial of medicine, a thermometer, and a towel.

“I took the liberty of looking through your cabinets. I hope that’s all right.”

“It’s fine.”

The towel was wet and cold, and he got down on his knees by Tooru’s bed and dabbed his face with it. Pushing away the strands of matted hair, wiping the sweat, pausing every now and again to place a kiss on his throbbing temple. Tooru was in a daze, barely conscious, but those kisses made his heart stop. He took Tooru’s temperature, confirmed that he did have a fever. Then Ushiwaka helped Tooru swallow a few spoonfuls of cereal, a few pills, and a sip of water.

“Now just rest. The fever will break soon enough. Keep drinking water.”

“All right, Doctor. Thanks.”

Ushiwaka shook his head and pushed Tooru’s hair back from his forehead.

“No need to thank me.”

“You can go if you need to...”

He shook his head again.

“I don’t. I won’t, ever. Unless you ask me to leave.”

Tooru stared at him wordlessly. Body and heart and soul all aching.

“Okay.”

He didn’t ask Ushiwaka to leave.

So Ushiwaka stayed.   


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15**

It was a full month of idleness before Tooru Oikawa decided what he wanted to do (aside from compose, of course, but that was taking much longer and proving much more difficult than he’d originally planned).

The month was long and hot, the middle of summer, but Tooru liked to be outside in the sun—being with Ushiwaka gave him a good excuse to desert his grand, lonely house and frolic in the more bustling parts of the city. He liked to put on sunglasses and go out for walks, nowhere to go and nobody to see, just because he could. Sometimes his body ached too much, or he came down with fevers and unbearable fatigue and his fingers felt that they were breaking in half, and on those days he would stay inside. Some days in his home, some days in Ushiwaka’s apartment. He even convinced Hajime, with Ushiwaka’s help, to let him take Gemini out for walks if he was in the area. So he learned that Hajime kept his key hidden in the plant on the first floor of the apartment building, so he could grab it, go up, be alone in Hajime’s apartment while he put on Gemini’s leash. It always smelled so absurdly like him, and there were always empty beer bottles and cigarette butts and total disarray. Gemini, who had already taken a liking to Tooru, became more and more attached—whenever the door opened and she saw him, she would pounce and lick his face and know, immediately, that they were going for a walk. She had a worn tennis ball that she liked to play fetch with, so Tooru would take her to the park and play fetch. All the while wondering if Michiko had ever done this. Wondering when the day would come that he and Hajime would be able to walk Gemini together without Tooru feeling such a horrible abyss within him.

But it was Wakatoshi Ushijima with whom Tooru spent most of his time during that month. Initially, Tooru told himself he would indulge Ushiwaka. He wants to love me, fine, let’s see what he can do. But it turned out that Ushiwaka was devoted and generous, loving, compassionate, went out of his way to make things better for Tooru. He cooked him dinner and drove him around and held him when he was sad, kissed him when his lips were dry and, when Tooru needed it, left him alone. He wasn’t overbearing (in some senses, at least). He couldn’t afford to be; he was too busy.

Tooru wasn’t unhappy being Ushiwaka’s lover. Far from it. He liked the attention. The adoration. Was comforted by the fact that if he felt the urge to cry, Ushiwaka would lend him a shoulder—then again, so would Hajime.

(But that was different. That was much harder. Hajime was dangerous and Ushiwaka was safe and that was the difference.)

Ushiwaka’s earnestness continued to frustrate Tooru. Because Tooru wasn’t a kind lover. He insulted Ushiwaka and started pointless, petty arguments, and always Ushiwaka responded with a dumbfounded look and a sincere, unwarranted apology. How could he know what he was apologizing for? His honesty? The too-pure glisten in his eyes? The fact that he wasn’t and never could be Hajime Iwaizumi? Tooru was never fair to Ushiwaka and Ushiwaka didn’t mind—knew that, and didn’t mind—and that was part of the reason Tooru was so very charmed by and attracted to him. He was so in love with someone being this desperate to please him.

Sometimes, because of Ushiwaka’s work, they slept in different places: Tooru in his home, Ushiwaka in his. Or the precinct. But, a lot of the time, they switched between places. Ushiwaka would sleep at Tooru’s house, then Tooru at Ushiwaka’s. Tooru always preferred spending the nights in Ushiwaka’s apartment because there was no piano there to make him hate himself for his inability to play it, and he became attracted and addicted to the smell of Ushiwaka’s sheets. He didn’t have a dog like Gemini, but his apartment never smelled like cigarettes or whiskey, and he was always clean and beautiful. And he didn’t mind when Tooru rambled about the imaginary conversations he had with Rachmaninoff in his head, despite not knowing a word of Russian. Hajime had always listened, but never understood. Ushiwaka indulged and humored Tooru in a way that was unique. Always put his arm around his shoulder to make sure he _knew_ , _felt_ , that Ushiwaka listening. Stared at him with hard, focused eyes, kissed the corners of his eyes with cold lips. He liked to talk to Tooru about music, but more than that, he liked to listen to Tooru.

And that meant everything.

 

* * *

 

It was the week before Tooru’s birthday and he was sitting on his couch, looking at a sheet of messy, penciled-in music. There was a glass of lemonade on the table next to him, and every so often, he would lift his hand from Ushiwaka’s head on his lap to take a sip. It wasn’t particularly late. Three, maybe four in the afternoon. One of Ushiwaka’s rare days off, and as soon as he had put his head in Tooru’s lap he had fallen asleep, his bulky body stretched out on the couch. Tooru didn’t mind. He turned on his surround-system speakers, put on his glasses, and decided to work on editing the first page of his composition. The only page of his composition. He had gone over it so many times that he could hear the notes clearly in his head, despite the clashing music from the speakers. He ran his fingers absentmindedly through Ushiwaka’s hair and became lost in the cyclical nature of it all, the feel of his bristly hair and the crinkling of the paper and the cool, tart lemonade on his tongue.

He was listening to Rachmaninoff’s second piano concerto. It was the first time he had listened to it in over six years. Not because he didn’t like it; actually, it was one of his favorites. But it was one of the pieces he had played at Carnegie Hall, where his father had called and told him that Hajime Iwaizumi had died in a car accident, so he hadn’t been able to bear listening to it. Now, though, he could immerse himself completely in it. Ushiwaka’s breaths were warm and steady on his thighs. Still, fast asleep, heavy-limbed.

Something about his composition wasn’t right. The pieces weren’t fitting together. He couldn’t see Chopin, Beethoven, Liszt, ever approving of an asinine, trite piece like this. But he had the basics. He just needed to figure out what to do with them. He took another sip of his lemonade and brushed his fingertips over Ushiwaka’s temple. The only time the tension ever left his body was when he slept. Tooru liked that, liked the vulnerability that he seemed so afraid to reveal. For good reason. Criminals took advantage of vulnerability.

Tooru did, too.

He couldn’t help but lean down and kiss Ushiwaka’s head. The way he knew Ushiwaka did when he was pretending to be asleep.

A wild thought entered his head, because for some reason he was thinking about his piano teacher. A man named Nobuteru Irihata, though he couldn’t figure out why he was thinking about Irihata-sensei. He hadn’t been his piano teacher for long. A few years, after Tooru confessed to his parents that he was staying late after school and sneaking into the upperclassmen’s music rooms to tinker with the piano. When Irihata-sensei realized that Tooru was a genius, he decided not to teach him anymore.

“He doesn’t need me for piano, trust me,” he said to his parents. “He works hard enough on his own.”

But Tooru still used to call him for advice and they would meet up every once in a while. He hadn’t seen him for a long time. But sometimes he would think of him. Someone who had helped him build his interest in piano into a burning passion.

He picked up the phone and called Takahiro, fingers still entwined in Ushiwaka’s hair.

“Hello?”

“Makki~! Are you busy? I wanna talk to you about something.”

“Nah, just trying to figure out what I’m doing that convinces you to keep paying me.”

“That’s actually what I’m calling about.”

“Oh? Decided you’re gonna sign that modeling contract? Even sexy ol’ Kuroo at the bar thinks it’s a good idea, and you always take his advice.”

“No, no, I don’t want to sign the modeling contract.”

“The clock’s ticking on that one. A few more years and—”

“I’ve thought of something I could do to keep earning money.”

“Right, because _that’s_ what matters.”

“I mean, something that will keep my name from dying out while I work out this composing stuff,” Tooru sighed. Takahiro was silent. “Aren’t you going to ask me what it is?”

“Your wish is my command. What is your great idea, King Oikawa?”

“Well, I can’t really play anymore, but that doesn’t mean I can’t teach.”

“Teach? You wanna _teach_?”

“Why do you sound so appalled?”

“Teachers are always old washed up pianists who never made it. You made it. Don’t you think it’s a little...demeaning?”

“Demeaning? Absolutely not. Piano teachers are the ones who instill passion and desire in budding pianists.”

“Fucking spare me, would ya?”

“I mean it!” Tooru paused, trying to contain his anger. “Or don’t you believe in what teachers do? Because I hope you know, I don’t need someone on my team who thinks like that.”

“All right, all right, sheesh. Well, if I were to put your name out, you’d get tons of kids at your door in no time.”

“I don’t want to do it like that. I don’t want to be swamped.”

“Of course not. You’re fragile.”

“And you’re getting on my last nerve.”

“Sorry, sorry, go on.”

“Start small. Talk to a few affluent families in the area, families with young children. Once I’ve figured out what I’m doing, we can spread.”

“Elitist much?”

“Are you deaf? I said _start small_. Don’t worry. I have enough money that I don’t need to worry about letting lower class kids be my students. But I just want to focus on a smaller group for now. Do you think you can handle that?” He added a patronizing tone to the end of his question, and he could tell that Takahiro was getting anxious on the other end.

“Yeah, I can do that.”

“Perfect. Tell them that I can start as soon as possible.”

“Fine.”

“Listen, I know you’re nervous about this, but it’ll be fine. I promise. When have I ever done something to make you not trust me?”

Takahiro was silent.

“Exactly. Now go have a glass of wine or something.”

He hung up the phone and, satisfied, leaned his head back over the couch and stroked Ushiwaka’s shoulder. He moved slightly, his cheek rubbing Tooru’s thighs, but didn’t wake up. Tooru didn’t mind. He’d had a long week with a grueling investigation. Still, he wished that Ushiwaka would wake up, tell him all about the investigation, and then Tooru could tell him that he was going to be a piano teacher.  

 

* * *

 

Tooru was asleep, cheek against the piano and arms spread out along its keys. He was getting drool all over the beautiful masterpiece and he was sixteen years old today. He was dreaming, but one of those blurry dreams that send you soaring and then make you sad because you can’t remember a single detail—only that you had the feeling like you were flying. As if you knew what flying even felt like. Sunlight was dripping over him and making him sweat, but he was too deeply asleep for it to bother him, and too exhausted. He’d spent another night at the piano and time had escaped from him. He had an exam that he hadn’t studied for. He was most certainly going to fail.

In the midst of his foggy dreams, he felt soft shaking on his shoulder. He resisted the instinct to open his heavy, aching eyes, but the shaking came harder and incessant, so he forced his eyelashes up. He couldn’t open them very wide because the light made them water and burn. But in that light, like some sort of angel, like Apollo, like someone jumping straight out of his stupid forgotten dream, he saw Hajime. Kneeling beside him at the piano, shaking him awake, the expression on his face a combination of angry and concerned. Tooru realized that he must have looked a mess but couldn’t bring himself, groggy and disoriented, to care. If Hajime, who’d seen him at his very best, didn’t love him then, it wouldn’t matter now that he looked pretty repulsive.

“Iwa-chan,” he mumbled, his vision becoming clear. He wiped the drool on the corner of his lips with the back of his sleeve and sat up.

“You’re a real doofus, you know that?”

“So you say. What’d I do this time?”

“It’s, like, noon.”

“Yeah?”

“We agreed to get brunch at eleven. Remember?”

Hajime leaned his cheek on his elbow against the piano, making it wheeze in atonal, jumbled notes. Tooru’s eyes were dry from the contact lenses, but he didn’t want to take them out at that particular moment because then the clarity of Hajime’s face would disappear, and the thought of that made him queasy. Why couldn’t it be like this every morning? Waking up to the sound of Hajime’s voice, the rhythm of is breaths? Tooru hated himself for thinking that. It was weird. It was really fucking weird. He rubbed his eyes.

“Fuck, you’re right. I’m sorry.”

“Jesus Christ, Shittykawa, do you even remember _why_ we were supposed to go to brunch?”

“To eat pancakes.”

“I mean, yeah, but there’s another reason?”

“Uh, you got a really big tip recently, and—”

“It’s your birthday, idiot!”

Tooru blinked as the realization hit him. It was his birthday, wasn’t he? He was finally turning sixteen. He smiled, and then his smile grew, and then he was laughing uncontrollably.

“Hey, what’s so funny? You think this is funny? I’ll punch you so hard...”

“What part of this _isn’t_ funny, Iwa-chan?” he breathed through his laughter.

“The part where you’re overworking yourself again.”

Hajime’s straight, not-at-all joking words made Tooru’s laughter fade. He sniffed, leaned his elbows forward on the piano, and gave Hajime a gentle smile.

“It’s fine. I just have a concert coming up.”

“Remember what the doctors said last time. If you keep this up it could cause chronic damage.”

“I know. But I can’t help it. I’ll be at the piano and my fingers just carry me away into the night,” he grinned. Hajime scrunched up his face incredulously and nudged one of Tooru’s elbows, making him slip. He nearly hit his face against the piano.

“Fucking liar. Do you think I’m an idiot? You think I don’t know that you stay up all night crying over this piano?”

Tooru was completely taken aback and could do nothing but blink, dumbfounded and crestfallen. Hajime’s face was so angry, twisted like a tornado ravaging Tooru’s insides. He was hurt and Tooru couldn’t understand it.

“You think that you can just pretend to be the coolest guy ever. You think I’m stupid?”

“N-no—”

“Then stop lying to me!”

Tooru couldn’t help but smile again. A softer smile. He had the strangest urge then, to reach out and touch the corner of Hajime’s eye.

“Okay. Sorry.”

“Go wash your face. I’m buying you pancakes.”

“You’re the best, Iwa-chan.”

“I know. Hurry up. I’m starving.”

It was the first time that Tooru really, consciously thought to himself, I think I’m in love with Hajime Iwaizumi, but he came to the conclusion that he’d been in love with Hajime Iwaizumi his entire life.  


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

July 20th was sweltering. Tooru spent the day in Ushiwaka’s air-conditioned apartment, sprawled on the couch, drinking lemonade, fanning himself and exchanging messages with Takahiro about scheduling for the next few weeks. As Tooru had predicted, it wasn’t hard finding families who wanted their children to learn piano from the best, so he was going to start lessons. On his way out that morning, Ushiwaka had kissed his lips, tasting of apologies, and wished him a happy birthday. Saying he would take him somewhere special tonight. Still half-asleep, Tooru had waved him out the door. He’d gotten calls from Takahiro, Issei, his mother (which he ignored), Kuroo (an unlikely friend, but a friend nonetheless), and, of course, Hajime, wishing him a happy birthday. It didn’t feel different, turning twenty-five. It felt exactly the same as twenty-four. There was nothing in his life that was changing, nothing to make him feel more mature, feel like he’d grown, absolutely nothing but the wrinkles between his eyebrows and the dull luster in his tired eyes.

Hajime asked if he could stop by sometime during the day, during a break, to give Tooru his birthday present. Tooru was hesitant at first; he wasn’t sure what it would be like, alone with Hajime in Ushiwaka’s pristine apartment.

Hey, Shittykawa. Happy birthday.

Thank you :)

Can I come over and wish you a happy birthday in person? I got you a gift.

Of course you can. Thank you.

Are you gonna be home at noon? I’ll have a quick lunch break.

I’m actually spending the day at Ushiwaka-chan’s. You know where his apartment is, right?

Yeah, yeah, sure. I’ll see you there. I won’t stay long, I promise.

So at 11:43, Tooru found himself pacing Ushiwaka’s apartment in spandex shorts, a tank top, fanning himself and staring with a pout at the ceiling. Smooth Yiruma (perhaps not ideal for a sunny day but Tooru found strange magic in certain pieces of music) flowed through the apartment. He kept throwing cursory glances at the door. Waiting for the knock that would make him jump and turn red from the toes up, make him practice his impish little smile. Fuck, his fingers really hurt today. He’d gotten out of bed and put ice on them but was too stubborn, too proud, too fucking stupid to take his medicine. Without Ushiwaka around to pester him he didn’t feel the need to. Taking medicine would mean giving in, would mean admitting that his fingers needed help. And Tooru hated that so much it made him lightheaded.

The knock came at 11:56. He stood and stared at the door for a moment, because he didn’t want to seem desperate. Didn’t want to seem like he’d been waiting for the opportunity to jump at the door like a dog running to its food. After what he figured was an ample beat, he leisurely walked to the door and, with his sweaty, shaking fingers, opened the door. Hajime stood, also sweating, dressed in nice work clothes. There were dark, heavy bags under his eyes, a weary look on his face, not even a hint of a smile on his chapped lips. His hair was imperfectly coiffed. Tooru wasn’t sure what expression he was making as his gaze fell upon his soulmate, looking as if he hadn’t slept in years and still wishing more than anything that he could kiss him.

“Hi,” he said with a soft smile.

“Hey,” Hajime responded, forcing his own smile. “Happy birthday.”

He held up a flat white box with a pink ribbon, as if to prove that he meant what he said. Tooru smiled again and led him into the apartment. The room suddenly became even warmer, and Tooru mused that this must be what hell felt like. Surrounded by flames licking at your ankles, your calves and your shins, your alligator elbows and your pearly shoulders and your mouth agape in horror. This was hell, he thought, he convinced himself, watching Hajime take off his shoes and slide onto the couch like Lucifer himself. There was nothing graceful about him, and still grace, beauty, like water, was the only thing Tooru could see. He walked back toward the living room and wondered what Hajime saw when he saw Tooru walk like that. They’d said “I love you” infinitely that night six years ago but they’d never gotten to say why. Tooru wanted so desperately to know why, at some point in his life, Hajime had loved him. “All Myself To You” began to play.

“You look tired,” Tooru teased, seating himself lightly on the arm of the chair. “Bad guys keeping you up all night?”

“Don’t get me started,” Hajime sighed. He arched his neck over the back of the sofa, the same way he’d done at Tooru’s house about a month ago. The way he did when he was exhausted and worn down and Tooru wanted to massage his shoulders and kiss his neck until the tension dissipated into white, blinding pleasure. Hajime opened his eyes and caught Tooru’s gaze for a split second before Tooru whipped his head away.

“Thanks for coming,” he said hastily.

“Of course. It’s the least I could do. You had a whole big thing for me.”

“I’m rich though.”

“Fuck off,” Hajime hissed, but there was laughter in his voice.

There was tension and awkwardness and they could both feel it, because last time, Hajime had kissed him and Tooru had kicked him out and they’d forced themselves to stop loving. After an eternity of silence, Hajime opened his mouth to speak and Tooru panicked.

“Do you want a glass of lemonade?” he asked. Hajime blinked. “I’ll go get you some lemonade, hard working detective.”

“R-right. Thanks.”

Tooru went to the kitchen, where the pitcher of lemonade was sitting expectantly in the fridge. He opened the cabinet where Ushiwaka kept the glasses and at that very moment, the moment when he tried to grasp it, his fingers decided it was the right time to flare up. Pain that was so excruciating it made him see flashes of colors erupted in his joints. He withdrew his hand and grasped it for a few moments, gritting his teeth until his head ached. He turned his back to the living room so Hajime wouldn’t notice. The initial flash of pain passed, leaving a dull ache. Tooru quietly grasped the glass, but now his fingers were shaking so horribly that he could barely do that. Clumsily, he managed to get the glass down to the counter, but now was the most difficult part: pouring the lemonade.

He moved slowly and silently, desperate for Hajime to remain oblivious. Hajime, Ushiwaka, Issei, and Takahiro were the only ones (besides his parents) who knew about the arthritis, but he hated bringing it up. Hated talking about it. Hated people seeing him crippling underneath its weight.

So he stayed silent as he tried to wrap his fingers around the handle of the lemonade pitcher, still in the fridge. He pressed his palm and tried to curl his fingers, tried to push past the stiffness and the reluctance in his bones. They resisted, and they resisted well. His left eye closed and his tongue slipped from his mouth as he _pushed_. Until finally, those trembling-like-earthquake fingers closed around the handle of the pitcher. He wasn’t over the hill yet. They still quivered horribly. He pressed his other palm to the body of the pitcher and tried, slowly, to lift the pitcher. It came up off the refrigerator shelf and he shuffled toward the glass, miles and miles away, waiting to be filled with lemonade.

Everything fell apart when he tried to pour the lemonade. The pitcher dropped like a rock to the bottom of a lake and he found himself in a pool of lemonade, tears on his eyes and blinding pain in his hands. Hajime was there in seconds, asking him what happened, if he was okay, did you take your medicine, do you have a fever, do you need me to call a doctor, where are the paper towels, go sit down it’s fine don’t worry don’t worry. Hajime led Tooru to the bathroom to wash up, and grabbed towels to wipe up the mess. Tooru was embarrassed, so embarrassed, that he couldn’t even say anything, do anything, except shake his head meekly. When they found themselves back on the couch, Hajime didn’t have any lemonade.

“You have to take your medicine,” Hajime said quietly, staring at his lap.

“I know.”

“Are you...feeling okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“Sorry. No, I’m not feeling okay.”

“I could’ve poured the lemonade myself, you know.”

Tooru knew that Hajime was just trying to lighten the mood, so he forced himself to smile.   

“Just take it easy,” Hajime continued. He took a risk, a calculated risk, Tooru could tell, and put his hand on Tooru’s shoulder. It made Tooru feel both better and worse. Better because Hajime was doing what he could to comfort him. Worse because it was just that. A touch to the shoulder and nothing else. “Why don’t you open your gift?”

“Why don’t you open it for me?” Tooru scoffed.

“Right.”

Hajime, a forced smile on his weary lips, grabbed the white box and undid the pink ribbon. Put it gently on the table. Lifted the lid of the box and handed it to Tooru. His hands had quieted a bit, the pain had subsided slightly, so he was able to slowly reach in and lift the gift out of the box. It was a large framed photograph. One that Tooru had long ago forgotten about. They must have been eighteen when it was taken; Tooru was on Hajime’s back, throwing peace signs at the camera, and Hajime carried him with his hands beneath his thighs (despite being shorter, Hajime had always been much stronger). Hajime’s expression was exasperated, but happy.

As soon as Tooru saw it the tears fell from his eyes. In the corner Hajime had written a note. Even the note, it seemed from the date, had been written back at eighteen. It read: “You’re kinda shitty sometimes but you’re my best friend anyway. Congrats, Oikawa. You deserve everything good that happens to you.” Tooru stared in stunned, teary silence.

“I meant to give it to you after your concert in New York City. Like a congratulations,” Hajime said quietly. “I...I mean, I never got the chance.”

“Iwa-chan.”

“Sorry. Maybe I should’ve given it to you earlier. But I figured—”

“Just shut up.”

He put the picture on the table and wrapped his arms around Hajime’s neck. Partly because he needed to touch him, feel him, be close to him, and partly because he couldn’t bear Hajime seeing the tears that rolled down his warm cheeks. Hajime hugged him back, even more tightly than Tooru could have ever hoped for.

_Do you hold Michiko like this, while she cries on your shoulder and wraps her legs around your waist?_

 “Thank you,” he murmured smoothly into Hajime’s ear. His voice was deceiving. Smooth and graceful and eloquent compared to the mess that was his tear-stained face. “It’s the best gift I could ever get on my birthday.”

“I’m glad you like it.”

His voice was wet and warm on Tooru’s neck and it made him dizzy with longing. He forced himself to pull away, forced himself to turn around on this well-trodden path to mistakes, only after he felt warm and happy and loved from the inside out. And only after the tears were dry. Hajime smiled and stood up, saying that he needed to get back to work, saying that he was glad he’d gotten the chance to stop by, saying that he was so, so happy Tooru liked his present. At the door, putting his shoes on, he reprimanded Tooru and told him (threatened him) to take his medicine to avoid spilling lemonade everywhere. Tooru promised he would. He waved goodbye and when Hajime was gone he closed the door, sat on the couch, and stared at the photograph for years. Read the note over and over again, imprinted every little detail of Hajime’s handwriting into his mind.

He realized later that day, when Ushiwaka came home eager to love him and wish him heartfelt happy birthdays, that he hadn’t thought of him once all day.

 

* * *

 

Tooru, unsurprisingly, was a natural at teaching piano. He could easily tell the level of skill of each new student (he started with five) and could determine within seconds the best ways to teach each student. Three of them were little girls, two of them little boys, and they all showed promise except for one, who was being forced by his obscenely rich parents to take lessons. Tooru understood and made him do simple things like scales, and picked fun pieces for him to learn. The others, it was clear, were looking to be classically trained. The hardest part about teaching, it turned out, was learning how to control his temper and impatience, but that came to him quickly. He didn’t have experience working with children but after the first few lessons he got the hang of it. Figured out how to speak to them, what to say and what to let stay in his head. He enjoyed the children because he saw the most well behaved parts of them, not the tantrums. The youngest was four, the oldest was ten. All with very different personalities, very different levels (the four year-old was already better than the ten year-old), and Tooru realized that he’d made a very good decision. Teaching even helped him compose. He was making progress.

There was one child that immediately stood out to him. A child who within seconds proved himself immeasurably talented, special when it came to music. He was six years old and his name was Tobio. He was the son of a prominent politician and, though Tooru wouldn’t be able to tell at first, Tobio would end up changing his life.

A pretty young man with silver hair and a beauty mark brought Tobio for his first lesson and would bring him for every lesson after that (Tooru held all his lessons in his own home). The young man introduced himself as Koushi Sugawara, Tobio’s nanny of sorts. When Tooru opened the door for them, Koushi was smiling, holding Tobio’s hand. Tobio, with his raven-black hair and blueberry blue eyes, was gripping Koushi’s hand tightly, pouting, staring at his fidgety feet.          “Oikawa-san. What a pleasure to meet you,” Koushi said, bowing at the waist. When Tobio remained silent, Koushi tugged lightly on his hand until he, too, bowed.

“Nice to meet you,” he murmured.

“The honor is mine. Please, come in.”  

He led them inside, where they sat on the nice couches of his large living room and there were already cups of lemonade ready for them. Tobio was quiet and shy, swinging his little legs while Koushi whispered encouraging words in his ear. In hushed, warm tones. The nanny was unnervingly comforting in his presence alone. Tooru sat down across from them and told them to make themselves at home.

“So, we’ll start with the basics. Why do you wanna play piano, Tobio-chan?” he asked. Tobio’s gaze flickered, and he bit his lower lip, and remained silent.

“Sorry. He’s nervous,” Koushi smiled.

“Of course.”

“His music teachers at school said that he showed promise, and when we asked him if he wanted to play piano, he jumped at the opportunity.”

“Ah. So he’s taken some lessons?”

“Basic music lessons in school, yes,” Koushi replied. “But, according to his teachers, he’s already leaps and bounds ahead of everyone else in his class.”

“Wonderful. That’s a wonderful start.”

Tooru leaned forward, bending down so he could look up into Tobio’s blushing face.

“You’ve come to the right place to learn piano, Tobio-chan,” he said softly. “I can teach you how to play anything you want.”

Tobio’s face lit up and he finally met Tooru’s eyes.

“Anything? You promise?”

“On one condition,” Tooru replied, lifting a finger. Tobio blinked and nodded. “I’ll teach you how to play anything you want, but only if you promise me you’ll practice every single day.”

“Deal!” he cried, without hesitation. Tooru reached his hand out and grabbed Tobio’s, and Tobio shook his hand with surprising firmness. No doubt learned from his politician father.

“All right then, Tobio-chan. Why don’t we get started?”

“On a real piano?”

“A real piano.”

Tobio, excited and fidgety, looked up at Koushi. Koushi ruffled his hair and nodded in approval. Then he stood up and bowed again.

“Thank you, Oikawa-san. I leave him in your care for the next hour.”

“You’re welcome to stay.”

“Thank you, but I have to pick up his brother from soccer practice,” he said.

“See you in an hour, then.”

When Koushi had left, Tooru put his hand on Tobio’s back and led him into the sunlit piano room. Tobio was starstruck, gawking, nearly trembling. None of his other students had reacted like this.

“I get to play on that piano?” he murmured.

“Yup. Why don’t you have a seat, and I’ll adjust it for you.”

He helped Tobio up onto the piano bench and then adjusted it for him. Then he pulled up a chair and sat beside him.

“Have you ever played on a piano before, Tobio-chan?”

He shook his head, staring in awe at the white and black keys spread out before him. Tooru imagined his face must have looked like that the first time, too.  

“We have to fix a few things before you play, all right?”

He nodded obediently.

“I want you to imagine that you’re holding bubbles in your hands. All the time. Just like this.”

Tooru held his imaginary bubble over the piano keys. Tobio imitated him. Perfectly on the first try, with both hands.

“Perfect. Good boy.”

Tobio was a natural. Much more so than Tooru had ever been.

He became both Tooru’s favorite and most detested student. Because he was, without a doubt, a true, uncontested musical genius.   


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

“Oikawa-sensei, what was the first thing you ever played?”

“Me? Oh, I don’t remember. Why?”

“Because I wanna play it, too.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Tobio-chan. It would be way too easy for you.”

“Oh.”

It had been about a month since Tooru’s birthday and first lesson with Tobio. Tobio was now taking lessons with him twice a week and, as he spoke, practiced with ease and fluidity his scales and arpeggios. Tooru watched his fingers with faked dispassion, leaning his cheek on his hand against the piano.

“But you promised you’d teach me how to play anything I want,” he mumbled.

“Trust me, you don’t want to play it.”

“Then what do I want to play?”

“You’ll figure it out soon enough. All right, E-minor.”

Tobio switched keys without even having to think about it.

“Good boy.”

His advancement was astounding. Tooru hadn’t thought such improvement in such a short span of time was possible. The only explanation was that Tobio was born to play piano, because he understood music perfectly. The theory, things that people struggled with for years, truly was child’s play to him. And despite the fact that Tooru had grown to love him, despite the fact that Tooru couldn’t help but make him an apprentice of sorts, Tooru hated him for his talent. It was talent that Tooru had never had and the fact that a boy of only six did have it and would, with practice and luck, certainly become a better pianist than Tooru had ever been, made him livid.

Just then, Tooru heard the door to the room open behind him, and gentle footsteps. Tobio stopped in the middle of the scale and they turned around to face their intruder. It was Ushiwaka, dressed in his boxers and pajama shirt, groggy and rubbing his eyes. Last night he had come home depressed and weary from a particularly hard case and had wrapped his arms around Tooru so tightly that he hadn’t been able to breathe. They hadn’t even had sex—Ushiwaka hadn’t had the energy for it. The only thing he’d been able to do was rest his head in Tooru’s lap until his ragged breathing became steady with slumber. Tooru had lulled him to sleep like a mother would a child.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Ushiwaka stumbled, meeting Tobio’s eyes. “I didn’t realize you had a student.”

“That’s all right. Tobio-chan, this is Ushijima,” Tooru said, forcing himself to use his last name. Tobio, more comfortable in Tooru’s presence after seeing him twice a week for about a month, bowed obediently.

“Ushijima, this is Tobio-chan, one of my students.”

“Nice to meet you, sir,” Tobio murmured.

“Likewise.”

“You know Ushijima’s a detective?” Tooru said. Tobio’s eyes lit up.

“Really? A detective?”

“That’s right. He catches bad guys and saves people.”

Tobio gawked, amazed, while Ushiwaka walked forward, his expression one of humility.

“Cool,” he murmured. “But, Oikawa-sensei, does he live here?”

“Sometimes,” Tooru winked. “He’s my partner.”

“Your partner? In what?”

Tooru and Ushiwaka looked at each other, amused.

“Let’s just say he’s my partner in everything,” Tooru winked again. “Now back to your scales. We still have a lot to get through.”

Tobio snapped back into position and continued his scales.

“Your partner in everything?” Ushiwaka bent down and whispered in Tooru’s ear, squeezing his shoulder. “I like that.”

“Oh, do you?”

He kissed Tooru’s temple, then left the room.

“Is he your partner, like...the way a mom and a dad are partners?” Tobio asked, still playing.

“Sort of.”

“Do you sleep in the same bed?”

“Sometimes.”

“So it’s like the same.”

“At this rate we’re never gonna finish, Tobio-chan.”

He snapped his lips shut and played, cheeks pink. But about a minute later, he spoke again.

“Shouyou sleeps in bed with me sometimes, when there’s a thunderstorm or something and he gets scared. Are we partners?”

“Yeah, you’re partners, but not the same kind.”

“There are different kinds of partners?”

“Yeah.”

“Oikawa-sensei, can I play Mozart today?”

“Only if you get through Czerny.”         

Tobio pouted, because he hated playing Czerny, which Tooru could absolutely understand.

“Is he gonna be your partner forever?” he asked quietly.

Tooru blinked, completely taken aback by the question. Tobio just kept playing, as if he hadn’t even said anything. His little fingers flew.

“Is that any of your business, Tobio-chan?” he said, more angrily than he’d meant. Tobio stopped playing abruptly and looked down at his tiny, quivering hands. His pout became overwhelming.

“I’m sorry, Oikawa-sensei.”

Tooru sighed, rubbed his temples, and then gently smoothed Tobio’s hair.

“It’s all right, Tobio-chan. A-major.”  

He played A-major perfectly.

 

* * *

 

Things with Ushiwaka were going smoothly and Tooru had become indifferent to the gradual escalation of the seriousness of their relationship, an escalation of which he’d initially been skeptical and wary. They were spending more time together and the presence of the other in their lives became a permanent, comfortable thing. Tooru became accustomed to Ushiwaka, to the point that his absence led to strange stirrings of discomfort and emptiness. Loneliness, really. They learned each other’s dreams and secrets, the thoughts that haunted them in the middle of the night and the ways they liked to be held and caressed. They learned the details of how they liked their coffee, their favorite pizza toppings, the way they brushed their teeth and hair in the morning, which shoe they put on first and the idiosyncrasies of their breathing at night. Tooru imagined that Ushiwaka was like a book, and he must have been more than halfway done reading it. Going back and highlighting passages, like the fact that Ushiwaka loved hayashi rice. Underlining things, like how angry he got when he spoke about criminals that he couldn’t understand. Ushiwaka was easy to read, and Tooru wasn’t sure if he was easy to read, too. All he knew was that Ushiwaka was reading very diligently regardless.

They loved with strange and evident asymmetry. At least, it was evident to Tooru. Perhaps if it had been evident to Ushiwaka he would have left Tooru, to save himself from the pain of not being loved as much (or even at all) as he loved. Tooru was as petty and temperamental as always, and never spared his lover the pain of it. Never checked himself because he was so confident that no matter what he did, no matter the names he called Ushiwaka or the stupid things he lost his temper over, Ushiwaka would still prostrate himself at Tooru’s feet and beg to kiss their soles.

So they loved.

Tooru convinced himself that if he liked spending time with Ushiwaka, if he got himself to the point that he couldn’t imagine his life without him (certainly he was already at that point), if he managed to fill the emptiness in his life with Ushiwaka, he would be able to love him. Even if it was twisted, disgusting love, it would be love.

Because the true love Tooru had to give was useless, with nowhere to go.

With the wedding coming up and Tooru’s status as best man, Hajime started to beg for his help with planning the wedding. His taste in aesthetics had always been much better and Michiko apparently had no interest, so it came to Tooru to help them fit the odds and ends together. It hurt him, it ripped his heart out, but he did it because he loved Hajime. Ushiwaka helped because his organizational skills were pretty top-notch, and though he wasn’t very good with wedding planning, the way he tried undeniably hard was charming and nice.

When Tooru wasn’t giving lessons, fucking Wakatoshi Ushijima, spending money with Issei and Takahiro at Kuroo’s bar, or planning Hajime Iwaizumi’s wedding, he was composing. The time he’d spent pitying himself had been transformed into productivity, and he wasn’t quite sure how. Perhaps it really was just Tobio-chan, his earnest blue eyes and talented, quick fingers, that inspired Tooru and gave him the ability to compose. Maybe it was the photograph that he now kept beside his bed. Maybe it was his newfound habit of listening to “Piano Man” every morning when he woke up and every night before he went to bed.

Maybe it was the fact that the wedding was drawing closer and closer.

In August he and Ushiwaka celebrated Ushiwaka’s birthday. Tooru promised Ushiwaka he would do whatever he wanted (both in public and in bed), and for some reason, Ushiwaka said that he wanted desperately to go hiking with Tooru in the mountains. Despite Tooru’s general aversion to activities like hiking, he kept his promise and they went hiking on August 13th. Tooru got so exhausted that about halfway up his knees—maybe starting to be affected by the arthritis, too—gave way and Ushiwaka carried him the rest of the way up. At the top of the mountain they had a picnic and Tooru took a nap, sprawled out on Ushiwaka’s chest. It was broad and strong and he could hear his heart beating so loudly.

While Tooru and Hajime continued to talk almost every day, they began to see each other in person less and less—and when they did, it was in a group. With Issei, Takahiro, Ushiwaka, Satori, other officers from the precinct. Tooru felt the horrible, inevitable separation approaching and it terrified him. The thought of Hajime slipping away from him a second time terrified him. He grasped the strings of their relationship as tightly as he could and swore that he would never let go.

 

* * *

 

The first time Ushiwaka told Tooru definitively that he loved him, they had just finished fucking and were lying sleepily in bed. His lips were on Tooru’s shoulder, his fingers buried in his chocolate hair. Tooru had his eyes closed, his body still tingling with pleasure.

“Tooru,” Ushiwaka said. He’d begun to use Tooru’s first name regularly and Tooru loved it.

“Hmm?”

“I have to tell you something.”

“Don’t sound so serious, just say it.”

“I think I love you.”

Tooru opened his eyes and looked over. Ushiwaka was gazing at him with painful sincerity.

“You think?” he pestered. Ushiwaka shook his head.

“I love you.”

Tooru thought for a moment of what to say. If he were to tell Ushiwaka that he loved him back, surely it would’ve been a lie. Surely it would be a bad idea to convince Ushiwaka that something like that was possible, that a miracle had become reality. Then again, was there anything to lose? The person who had and would always have every ounce of love Tooru had was getting married in a few months so did it really matter if Tooru told Ushiwaka he loved him, despite the impossibility of such a thing? It didn’t mean Tooru was tying himself to Ushiwaka. Yes, it meant that he was lying to Ushiwaka, but he’d always been lying to Ushiwaka so that wasn’t really a problem anymore.

“I love you, too.”

 

* * *

Moonlight Sonata was always fucking stuck in his head.

 

* * *

 

“Oikawa-sensei, when can I have my first recital?”

Tobio had finished running through fantasia in d minor. Tobio had chosen it himself. Tooru had a system of allowing his students to choose pieces: he himself would select five or six, play them, and let the student pick out of those. With his keen ear, Tobio had chosen Mozart’s fantasia, and it had both elated and frustrated Tooru, because he had played that piece at his first official concert.

“I’ve already scheduled it for you. It’s in two weeks.”

Tobio smiled and nodded, like the good little student that he was, and prepared to continue playing.

“But, Tobio-chan, it’s not just a regular recital,” Tooru continued. Tobio blinked at him.

“It’s not?”

“No, it’s a competition. Do you know what that means?”

Tobio shook his head.

“It means that if you win, more people will want to listen to you.”

“And that means I get to play more?”

“You betcha.”

Delighted, Tobio continued to practice. They had grown attached to each other and Tooru hated himself for it, because he wasn’t sure what kind of person he would end up being to Tobio. Tooru liked to pinch his cheeks when he was angry with him, smooth his hair when he was being apologetic, enthusiastically kiss his cheeks when he played something with such passion and beauty that it brought tears to Tooru’s eyes. But Tooru snapped at Tobio, certainly more than was acceptable or normal. He always apologized, always smoothed that hair with gentle gestures, but it didn’t change the fact that he snapped. And Tobio was a brave little boy, too. He never cried. He took Tooru’s tantrums with pouts and shaky hands, but he never cried. And he always apologized first.

“I’m sorry, Oikawa-sensei.”

Those apologies snapped Tooru back into place and reminded him that he loved Tobio.

“So do you like Mozart a lot, Tobio-chan?”

“Yeah, I like Mozart,” Tobio replied. “Who’s your favorite, Oikawa-sensei?”

“My favorite?” Tooru pretended to think about it. “Rachmaninoff.”

“Rachm...who?”

“He’s Russian. Do you know where Russia is?”

Tobio pointed to the left.

“Good boy, to the west. Do you know what language they speak in Russia?”

“Russian.”

“Good boy.”

He lightly pinched Tobio’s cheek.

“Then I want to play Rachm...Rachma...”

“Rachmaninoff.”

“I wanna play him, too.”

“All right, Tobio-chan. We can learn a Rachmaninoff piece next.”

On that particular day, after their lesson, Koushi sent Tobio back to the car and stayed to speak with Tooru for a moment.

“I just want to thank you,” he said, with a gut-wrenchingly sincere, white smile.

“Not at all. Tobio’s a pleasure.”

“You’ve changed his life,” Koushi insisted. “Practicing lifts his spirits—Shouyou’s, too. He feels like he has a purpose now, and he feels supported and loved. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.”

He bowed at the waist. Tooru hadn’t realized before that moment that he could have an impact like that on someone’s life without actually playing himself.

“Does he practice a lot?”

Koushi nodded.

“Keep an eye on him. If he practices too much it can be dangerous. Don’t let him stay at the piano without eating and drinking, and never for more than a few hours at a time,” he said strictly. Koushi nodded again, a bit surprised at the sudden demand.

“Oikawa-san, do you think he can win? The competition, I mean?”

Without hesitation, Tooru nodded.

“No doubt in my mind.”   

After they were gone, Ushiwaka walked out of the kitchen, wrapped his arms around Tooru’s waist, and kissed the back of his neck.

“You’re doing something wonderful,” he murmured. Tooru touched his hands and stared at the door vacantly.

“I guess so.”

“Come back to bed. It’s my day off.”

“Okay.”

They went back to bed for a few hours. Then, while Ushiwaka napped, Tooru went downstairs to write down the composition scribbles in his head and listen to “Piano Man” while his phone buzzed with Hajime’s text messages. He had the taste of Ushiwaka on his tongue and Ushiwaka’s breaths in his ear, his fingertips on his skin and his voice echoing in his mind, and none of it distracted him at all. He was a bit distracted, though, trying to think of which Rachmaninoff piece to give to ambitious Tobio. An etude, or one of the twelve romances. At some point he wanted Tobio to learn the elegy that Tooru himself so loved, but he didn’t think he was quite ready. Soon, though, surely soon, he would be.

No, he wanted Tobio right now to learn his prelude no. 5 in g minor.

He wanted so many things for him it seemed he was wanting a little less for himself, and that was a bit refreshing.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18**

        In October everything started to fall apart.

        They were at the Black Cat: Tooru, Ushiwaka, Hajime, Issei, Takahiro, and Satori. Fall had been sweeping into the city and Tooru welcomed it with open arms, though his instinct was to love summer with all his heart. The crisp breezes felt nice on his skin when he went to walk Gemini, and the rain was soothing when he sat at the piano surrounded by windows. It had been a surprisingly long week (for everyone) so they’d agreed on drinks. The place was crowded today, so they found themselves squeezed in at the bar, clanking glasses together, making stupid jokes, flirting with the bartender. Kuroo had gotten used to seeing them there and knew, almost by heart, what each person wanted to drink based purely on their expression. Tooru was drinking his favorite martini. On one side, Ushiwaka had his arm around his shoulder and was drinking a beer. On his other, his arm lightly brushed Hajime’s as he, too, drank a beer. Their conversation was idle and stupid but they were having fun. Somehow, he convinced himself that Hajime was watching him.

        “How’s the gig going?” Kuroo asked. Tooru blinked up at him.

        “Me? Oh, it’s good.”

        “Kids are pretty talented.”

        “Some more than others,” he shrugged. Kuroo laughed quietly and, noticing his drink was almost empty, began making him another. Just then the young man who lived with Kuroo, who Tooru hadn’t really seen around lately, appeared as if by magic, leaning against Kuroo’s arm and playing on a gaming system. He was cute, he was really cute, but he was quiet and didn’t interact very much with anyone. He was wearing the nicest little dress.

        “When are you gonna play piano again?” he asked quietly, without looking up.

        “You talking to Oikawa?” Hajime gasped, smiling. He was slightly drunk. The young man nodded, still without looking up.

        “Professionally, never,” Tooru replied.

        “I don’t mean professionally,” the young man clarified. “I mean, like, here.”

        He finally looked up, and pointed at the lonely, dust-gathering piano on the stage. His eyes glimmered and it seemed Kuroo couldn’t help himself then—he wrapped his arm around the young man’s shoulders, pulled him in tight, and planted a slobbery kiss on his temple.

        “Gross,” he mumbled, pushing himself away.

        Tooru looked down at his fingers. Red, but not as bad as they were some days. He wasn’t having trouble bringing the glass to his lips, wasn’t having trouble grasping Ushiwaka’s fingers while wishing they were Hajime’s. He thought for a moment of going and busting out a tune, if that was what people wanted. But something held him down. The young man wasn’t insistent. He grabbed a bottle of Coke and drank from it without bringing up the topic again when he was met with Tooru’s anxious silence.

        The night droned on. Issei and Takahiro complained that Tooru needed new headshots, so he dismissed them with a flicker of his wrist, telling them they could schedule whatever they wanted. Hajime was a bit quiet, maybe lost in a hazy drunken stupor, and Ushiwaka (he never really drank enough to get drunk, he was too responsible for drunkenness) and Satori discussed whatever it was two people like them discussed. Tooru jumped into conversations every so often but he, too, was quiet, swimming in the warmth of being this close to the person who loved him on one side, and the person he loved on the other.

        A little after midnight Hajime stood up from the bar and grabbed his coat. Then he turned to Tooru.

        “Oikawa,” he began, “I need your help.”

        “What are you talking about?” he blinked.

        “There were some things Michiko and I were hoping you could look at for the wedding—we’re trying to settle on a menu and both of us have shit taste.”

        “Fine. Send me your options and I’ll look at it tomorrow,” he said dismissively. He wasn’t in the mood for this.

        “It’s not that late. Just come over now. It’ll be quick, I promise.”

        He put his jacket on and nodded toward the door, and Tooru felt his heart doing somersaults. He glanced over at Ushiwaka, who shrugged.

        “It’s fine. I’ll leave the door open for when you get back, all right?”

        “All right.”

        He kissed Ushiwaka’s lips, lifted himself from the bar, and followed Hajime out. His apartment was within walking distance of the bar, so they just decided to walk. Hajime insisted that he needed a cigarette, and he was still a little drunk so Tooru helped him light up. The walk helped him clear his head. They didn’t talk much. They walked, hands in their pockets, back toward Hajime’s apartment in comfortable, easy silence. They weren’t expecting anything of each other and something about that made everything simple. On the surface, at least, everything was simple. Hajime didn’t need to know that underneath the surface, where Tooru’s heart was, everything was horribly complicated.

        “How are your hands feeling today?” Hajime asked, putting the keys into his apartment door.

        “They’re fine.”

        “Any bad fevers lately?”

        “No.”

        “Good.”

        He’d sobered up significantly. They walked, took off their shoes and their jackets, and Gemini pounced on them almost instantly. Tooru sat down on the couch while she spread out on his lap, desperate for belly rubs, and Hajime grabbed a messy, crumpled sheet of paper with various food items scribbled onto it. He didn’t sit down—he seemed restless, running his hands through his hair and pacing while Tooru looked over the list.

        “This looks fine to me. I’ve heard this caterer’s good,” he said, disinterested. He was watching Hajime.

        “Yeah? That’s a relief.”

        Tooru puckered his lips suspiciously. Hajime hadn’t stopped moving, almost incessantly, for at least five minutes now. Rubbing his hands together, licking his lips, pacing, pacing, pacing.

        “Iwa-chan.”

        “What?”

        “Why did you really ask me to come?”

        Hajime didn’t even try to deny anything. He just shook his head and kept pacing.

        “I’m kind of freaking out.”

        “Why?”

        “I don’t know if I’m ready for this whole marriage thing.”

        “Nothing will change except that you’ll have a certificate to prove you love each other. It’s just legal bureaucracies,” Tooru sighed. He knew he wasn’t being fair. Hajime needed him right now and he was being mean and dismissive but he couldn’t stop himself.

        “I’m committing myself.”

        “You’ve _been_ committing yourself.”

        “I could end up breaking her heart.”

        “She could end up breaking yours.”

        “You’re not helping.”

        Tooru gently moved Gemini’s large affectionate head from his lap and stood up with another heavy sigh. The guilt finally won. She rolled over and began napping.

        “I know. I’m sorry. It’s scary, and that’s okay. You’re just not in your right mind. You’re nervous and scared, but think about when you made the decision to marry her. You were thinking clearly. You had your reasons then, and nothing’s changed. Right?”

        “You showed up.”

        It seemed even Hajime hadn’t been expecting himself to say that. They both stared at each other. Stunned. Before Hajime closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and spoke.

        “I’ve been thinking.”

        “Dangerous territory, Iwa-chan.”

        “We never really...moved on.”

        “You certainly did.”

        “Don’t pull that shit with me,” he hissed. “You know I didn’t. I couldn’t.”

        “You don’t have to keep creating feelings that aren’t there.”   

        “At the very least, we never _talked_ about what happened.”

        “What is there to talk about?” Tooru replied. “It’s been...what, four months since our reunion? And it feels like no time has passed at all. I’d say we—”

        “That’s a fucking lie and you know it.”

        Hajime stared into Tooru’s eyes and his gaze was terrifying, icy, cut straight through every line of defense Tooru had set up around himself. Everything was crashing down. Hajime’s face was tense, his fists were clenched, and if Tooru didn’t know any better, he would’ve thought he could see tears in his eyes.

        “Before you showed up again I was so happy with Michiko. Everything was going perfectly and I never questioned being with her. And then you popped up out of fucking nowhere and...and now I...suddenly I feel like I fucked up somewhere.”

        “You didn’t fuck up anywhere.”

        “I mean, do I really love her? If I stay up late questioning whether this is the right decision, can I really say that I love her?”

        “You can say whatever you want.”

        They stared for a few moments, each holding back the torrent of emotions, accusations, confessions that was threatening to burst from their trembling lips.

        “Are you really in love with Ushiwaka?” Hajime suddenly asked.

        Tooru smirked and tilted his chin up. What an amusing question.

        “Do you need me to answer that?”  

        They stared.

        And then they leaped at each other like animals.

 

* * *

 

        “Oikawa-sensei, you told me there are different kinds of partners.”

        “Sure.”

        “I heard your partner—Detective-san—I heard him say that he loved you.”

        “Did you?”

        “Sometimes I tell Shouyou that I love him.”

        “That’s very nice of you, Tobio-chan. What a good big brother.”

        “So if there are different kinds of partners, does that mean there are different kinds of love, too? And each partner gets a special kind?”

 

* * *

 

        Passionate, heavy, rough, Hajime pushed Tooru up against the nearest wall and kissed him hard. Tooru let himself be driven wherever Hajime wanted, opened his mouth until it was wide, yearning, welcoming to Hajime’s desperate tongue. The gentle tenderness that Tooru was used to with Ushiwaka wasn’t here and he found that he’d been longing for this even more than he’d ever expected. This hard, deep passion, the intensity and the strength and the pain. His body, tingling with white excitement, responded so jarringly and with such intense pleasure that he could hardly move. He wrapped his arms around Hajime’s neck and clawed at the shirt on his back, relishing in breathlessness as Hajime pressed his knee up between his legs. When Hajime had stolen every last breath from his lips, Tooru pulled away, banged his head back against the wall, and found his breaths short and ragged. Grasping him tightly, fingers digging into his skin, Hajime began to thirstily kiss his neck. Press his knee up more, suck harder, until Tooru’s eyes fluttered closed and a moan escaped his red, swollen lips.

        “Ha...Hajime...”

        “Fuck, I’ve wanted this for so long.”

 

* * *

 

        “Love can mean a lot of different things. The way you love your brother is different than the way you love your dad, or the way you love Suga—”

        “Or the way I love you?”

        “Or the way you love me, Tobio-chan. Each person gets a different love because each person is different.”

        “I don’t know if I’ll have enough love for everybody.”

        “I think you’ll have plenty of love.”

        “Yeah?”

        “Yeah.”

 

* * *

 

        Tooru pulled Hajime’s shirt over his head, nearly ripping it in half and throwing it to some obscure, unimportant corner of the room. The only corner of the room that mattered was this one, where they were completely entwined, engrossed in the heat of their wild, erratic breaths and clammy skin. Tooru’s fingers hurt like hell. And the spots where Hajime bit his skin, they burned. His bronze palms left scathing imprints in Tooru’s pale skin and he imagined that his lips were starting to take on the shape of Hajime’s. As he clawed at Hajime’s back, pulling him in closer, Hajime forced him tight against the wall and breathed, panted, into his ear. Then he began whispering about the things he wanted to do to Tooru, the things he’d dreamed of doing to him since the moment he’d seen him again, the way he wanted to hear Tooru scream his name. The words made Tooru’s knees buckle. Hajime’s voice was made of lust and cigarette smoke.

        They were in too deep now and there was no stopping them.

        Hajime grabbed Tooru’s wrists and pinned them up above his head, sinking his teeth into his neck. As Tooru let out a cry of pain and rushing delight, Hajime brought one hand down his spine and into the back of his pants. Tooru moved his body to the rhythm of Hajime’s fingers and let himself fall flat against the wall. He wanted Hajime to take him harshly, mercilessly, passionately. Completely.

 

* * *

 

        “Is it okay to love one person more than another?”

        “Of course. It’s impossible to love everybody equally.”

        “That seems wrong.”

        “It is wrong. It’s not fair. But it’s how we are.”

        “We...?”

        “Human beings.”

        “Well, is it okay to not love someone at all?”

        “Tobio-chan, is there someone you don’t like?”

        “Kids at school who bully me and Shouyou.”

        “You can try to love them. But if you don’t, it’s okay. Some people don’t really deserve your love.”

        “That’s sad.”

        “Yeah. It is sad.”

       

* * *

 

        Bruised, scratched, tongues snaked together, they clambered toward the bedroom, stripping out of their clothes. As they slipped into the bedroom, Tooru paused, let Hajime kiss his lips, while he turned the lights on. Hajime didn’t seem to notice or care. In the brightness they tumbled onto the bed and it creaked. Their limbs became tangled together and they couldn’t breathe and they loved it. With his rough, calloused hands, Hajime pushed down against the vulnerable pieces of Tooru’s body and made him writhe, until he couldn’t make a sound he was so breathless. With renewed energy and fiery desire, Tooru rolled over until he was on top, straddling Hajime, feeling Hajime’s fingers tugging on his hair and thrusting his tongue down as far as it would go. He wondered if he would be able to reach Hajime’s stomach if he just opened wide enough. If he swallowed Tooru’s tongue. In the chaos, Hajime groped for the drawer in the nightstand. His fingers searched for a moment before he pulled out a condom. Tooru grabbed it from his hands, opened it slowly and tauntingly and basked in the red, drowsy, lustful look Hajime was giving him. His toned chest was rising and falling like the ocean.

        He slid the condom onto Hajime’s penis and lifted his hips up.

        They didn’t have to ask to know for sure that this was what they wanted.  

       

* * *

 

        “Oikawa-sensei?”

        “What is it, Tobio-chan?”

        “What do you do if you love someone and they don’t love you back?”

        “...Depends on how much you love them.”

        “What if you love them a lot?”

        “Well, if they don’t love you back, there’s nothing really you can do.”

        “Oh.”

        “You don’t have to worry about that. Never ever. Okay? You’ll always be loved.”

        “Promise?”

        “I promise. For as long as I’m breathing, you’ll be loved.”

 

* * *

 

        Tooru’s stretched out limbs and blue bruises ached terribly, but he could hardly feel the pain. As he lay there, his nose crushed against Hajime’s sultry neck and his arms draped over his back. Legs intertwined, heartbeats out of time. How long was it going to take before he caught his breath and his heart slowed to normal levels, before he woke up from this bizarre and surreal dream? He hoped never. Never ever. He could’ve lived the rest of his life there in Hajime’s arms.         

        Hajime was almost asleep, his eyelids heavy. Staring over his shoulders, Tooru grabbed his phone and sent a text message to Ushiwaka.

        Came down with a sudden fever. Staying at Iwa-chan’s tonight. See you tomorrow.

        Then he tossed his phone to the end of the bed. Gemini, awake from her nap, snuck into the now dark room and hopped onto the bed with them, making it shake. They were buried beneath the covers and ready to sleep into infinity.

        “Are you still awake?” Tooru whispered.

        Hajime nodded.

        “Can I tell you something?”

        He nodded again.

        “Will you remember it tomorrow? It’s important.”

        “Just tell me.”

        “I never stopped loving you once. Every second I thought you were gone I still loved you.”

        Hajime held him more tightly and pressed his sleepy lips to Tooru’s temple.         

        “I love you, too.”

        “Really?”

        “Yeah. Now go the fuck to sleep.”

        “Okay.”

        He fell asleep with his body cradled in Hajime’s arms. He was afraid for a moment, before his mind slipped away, that it was really just Ushiwaka, and his imagination had finally gotten the best of him.


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19**

Once, on one of Ushiwaka’s rare days off, he and Tooru decided to spend the day inside. It was a beautiful summer day but Tooru complained about the heat, about how sweat never looked good on his skin, so Ushiwaka relented despite his quiet desires to go for a picnic. They stayed in Tooru’s house, music encasing them. Tooru woke him up with sweet, slow sex and butterfly kisses, murmurs of fake love on his gullible lips. But sometimes, Tooru did feel it. That maybe he could love Ushiwaka, because if anybody deserved his love and devotion it was Wakatoshi Ushijima. Because Wakatoshi Ushijima knew how to love him, knew how to hold him and make him feel physical pleasure and emotional affection all at once. It was a beautiful feeling that he didn’t quite feel he deserved.

Ushiwaka was in the kitchen, making coffee, while Tooru moved around the room like a little bird that had just learned to fly. Arms spread out, on the tip of his bare toes, because the sun coming in through the windows inspired him and made him feel light. The smell of coffee and lemonade invigorated him. After putting the cups of fresh coffee on the table, Ushiwaka reached out and wrapped his arms around Tooru, swayed with him, kissed his neck over and over and over until Tooru’s laugh was ringing out.

“How did I get so lucky?” he murmured.

“I was drunk.”

Ushiwaka paused, and Tooru couldn’t help but roll his eyes.

“I’m kidding, babe.”

“Will you play something for me?”

“If you bring me my coffee.”

Tooru moved to the piano room, and Ushiwaka gripped his hands until the last second. Until his fingers slipped and he floated away. He grabbed the mugs of coffee and followed. As Tooru planted himself before the piano, his fingers hovering, as if dusting off the keys that Tobio had kept from gathering dust in the first place, Ushiwaka sat down in the chair next to him and put the coffee on the piano.

“Ah-ah! Not on the piano.”

“Sorry, sorry.”

He held the two cups like Tooru asked.

“What do you want me to play?”

“Something sweet. Not too sad.”

“I’ll play _Valse de l’adieu_ for you. You like that one, don’t you?”

Ushiwaka, not even smiling, nodded. Tooru leaned forward and kissed those stoic lips.

“All right.”

He positioned his hands above the piano and ran through the notes in his head. Spots of sunlight dotted the piano, as if lighting up for him the notes he needed to play. He played the first note, felt the slight ache in his fingers, but ignored it and fell into the piece.

That was how he played. He let himself fall off the cliff into the canyon, and suddenly he was surrounded by music and there was nothing else. Only him, spinning and soaring through the chords and the scales and the trills, the arpeggios, the cadences, the piano and the pianoforte and the lento and the scherzando. This piece wasn’t terribly fast, or terribly sad. It was in A-flat major, so that was natural. It was a bit melancholy though. It was about farewells, not bad, bitter farewells but good, sweet farewells. Farewells nonetheless. Tooru had played it at his last concert and loved it. It was a piece he had known for a very long time. A piece he had loved for a very long time. He always felt both a little sad and a little uplifted when he played it. That’s why he had chosen it for his last concert. He had dreamed of Chopin sitting next to him, rubbing his back and whispering in his ear, _Grasz pięknie, Tooru. Dziękuję Ci._ Today, he didn’t feel Chopin, though. Only Wakatoshi Ushijima. Humming beside him. Making his heart swell.

A minute and a half into the piece, back to the main theme, Tooru’s fingers gave up on him. They slipped and he made a mistake, then they clamped up and burned and he couldn’t play anymore. Shaking, quivering, blinking back red, angry tears, Tooru slammed his hands down onto the piano.

“Damn it!” he screamed. Forgetting for a moment that he wasn’t alone.

“Tooru.”

“Damn it, damn it!”

He slammed his hands onto the piano again and the room quivered with the disgusting sound. His forehead fell down onto the keys and he was lost in thoughts of self-hate, betrayal, terrible scalding anger. His walls were torn down in the next moment, when he felt Ushiwaka’s large, smooth hands on his back. His first instinct was to flinch. And when Ushiwaka began stroking his back, tucking his hair back, murmuring into his ear, the tension in his muscles settled and he brought his head to Ushiwaka’s chest. Ushiwaka held him close.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t finish it for you,” Tooru murmured, staring down at his fingers.

“It’s all right.”

Ushiwaka grabbed Tooru’s burning hands and brought them to his lips. He kissed each one of his fingers, his lips feeling of nothing but love, sincerity and stupid earnestness.

“My fingers are staging a full-on revolt,” he said bitterly.

“I love them regardless. They’ve already given me enough happiness to last me a lifetime.”

Then he kissed Tooru’s forehead and smoothed his hair.

“Come take your medicine, Tooru.”

Tooru nodded, and Ushiwaka led him back to the kitchen.

* * *

 

He woke up in the middle of the night, thinking for a moment that it was just early, that Hajime was heading off for his routine early-morning run, but there was no light coming in through the windows. It was still pitch black. Tooru curled up under the blanket and tried to figure out what had woken him up. Gemini, maybe? But as his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he saw that she was curled up at the end of the bed, fast asleep. It was only then that he noticed Hajime was awake. He was sitting up in bed, leaning back against the headboard, headphones on and laptop open. The only light in the apartment was coming from the computer screen. Tooru turned around and was about to grab Hajime’s arm, bury his face against his skin, but he stopped himself. It looked like Hajime was watching a YouTube video. Tooru narrowed his eyes, as quiet as possible, not able to see well without his glasses or contact lenses.

And then, over Hajime’s broad shoulder, he saw himself.

Tooru stopped breathing. Bit down on his lower lip, hard, until he convinced himself that he could taste the blood. Metallic. His body ached and tingled and his stomach turned and turned and turned. He couldn’t stop it.

He recognized what the video was from the outfit he was wearing and the way he was moving. It was from a concert Tooru had done about two years ago. Where he’d performed _Morceaux de Fantasie_. It was the elegy that he’d told Hajime about, when Hajime had actually asked him, What’s your favorite piece? When Hajime had looked into his eyes and _cared_. Tooru felt that Hajime had reached his scarred fingers down into his throat and squeezed his heart, pulling out the strings and any oxygen in there when he pulled his hand out. Now, sitting in bed beside him, he held Tooru’s soul in his clenched fist. Tooru was afraid that he might cry. He was smoking a cigarette.

Before Hajime had a chance to turn and realize that Tooru, wild-eyed and trembling, was awake, Tooru smashed his face against the pillow. Pretended to be asleep. He could hear Hajime swallow when he took the deep drags from his cigarette—fuck, have I ever wanted to be the yellow end of a cigarette that badly before? They rocked him back to sleep. Maybe tomorrow he would ask Hajime to try a drag from that cigarette. After Hajime had already smoked from it, obviously.

When Tooru fell asleep again, he did it to the lullaby of Rachmaninoff’s elegy and Hajime’s cigarette drags.

The next time he woke up it was because Gemini had hopped onto the bed and burrowed under the covers beside him, and her pants in his ear forced his heavy eyes open. He was unbelievably tired—more exhausted than he had been in months. In the darkness of the room, he was barely able to make out her eager, wide-eyed face in front of him, and despite his unrelenting exhaustion, he smiled.

“Hi, sweetie.”

He inched closer, until he could hold her and bury his face against her fur. Somewhere in the distance, the background of this sleepy, tired world, he heard a running shower. Gemini smelled like dirt and fall. Tooru figured that she and Hajime must have just returned from their morning run, which meant it was around 6:30. Within moments he was practically asleep again, lulled by Gemini’s soft fur and the sound of the shower. His brain was in a complete haze and his body ached and he felt there was nothing he could do but sleep.

A few minutes later the bathroom door opened, and Tooru didn’t even blink, the desire for sleep was so pervasive. His arms around Gemini’s neck, their bodies rising and falling together, he couldn’t lift his head. Not when the steamy warmth of the bathroom floated over him, not when he heard familiar footsteps, not even when he felt hot hands brushing away the hair on the back of his neck. He drew in a long, deep breath when he felt Hajime’s lips touch the curved connection between his neck and his shoulder.

“So Gemini’s replaced me, huh?” he whispered in Tooru’s ear.

Tooru managed a nod. He kissed Tooru again and then walked from the room. Vaguely, he heard Hajime in the kitchen, pouring food into Gemini’s bowl. At the sound, she jumped out of bed and rushed after him, leaving Tooru cold and alone in that bed. It wasn’t for long, though—moments later Hajime was back in the room. Tooru forced his eyes open and, when he saw Hajime leaning against the doorway, blinked and lazily gestured for him to come. Hajime obeyed without so much as a sarcastic retort. He crawled back into bed and kissed Tooru’s outstretched fingertips.

“Sleepy?” he murmured.

Tooru nodded again.

“You can stay and sleep as long as you need. I have to get to work in a few hours.”

Hajime started to brush away the stray hairs matted to Tooru’s face. Perhaps to see his face more clearly. Perhaps out of habit. Perhaps for no reason at all.

_I’m dreaming, aren’t I?_

Hajime leaned down and kissed Tooru’s lips, and the expression on his face was so horribly serious. Like it was the most important thing he had ever done and the most important thing he would ever do. Tooru let Hajime drink him in, feel him, because it seemed like something he really needed to do. He pulled away after a moment and held Tooru’s face. A treasure of some sort, a precious gem he’d been searching for. That was how he looked at Tooru. It didn’t seem fair to Tooru that all this time, they’d both been hurting the same, and it had taken them this long to snap. They’d been bending, bending, bending, until they’d broken. Hajime before Tooru. Nonetheless, they were both broken now.

“Iwa,” he breathed. His voice was hoarse, hardly there at all.

“Yeah?”

“We really messed up, didn’t we?”

Hajime paused for a moment, still staring, still holding his treasure, before he nodded.

“Yeah. We messed up.”

“It wasn’t really our fault, though.”

“It’s not our fault we fell apart, you mean. Back then.”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t know if we can blame anyone else for this, though.”

“Did you mean what you said last night?” Tooru heard himself ask. “When you told me you loved me?”

“Yeah. I did.”

“For how long?”

“I don’t know.”

“How can you not know?”

“Sorry.”

Hajime kissed Tooru’s smiling lips again.

“Fuck, we really did mess up,” he said.

Tooru’s head, like lead, dropped back down to the pillow and he grasped Hajime’s hand like an infant.

“What now?” he replied softly. His eyes closed while Hajime brushed his hair back.

“I dunno.”

“Do you love me as much as you love Michiko?”

Silence.

“Do you love me enough to just abandon the life you set for yourself?”

“The hell are you talking about?”

“I was lying yesterday, when I was telling you marriage isn’t a big deal. It is a big deal.”

“Shit, I know.”  

“You’re planning your life with her. Together. Am I wrong?”

Silence.

“You have to figure out what you want,” he told Hajime.  

“I want you.”

Tooru, eyes still closed, smiled. But his smile was shaky.

“I don’t know if that’s true,” he murmured.

“And just what do you know about what I want?”

“Not a single thing.”

Hajime pursed his lips mockingly, and kissed Tooru again.

“Just trust me when I tell you that I want you. Just you.”

“I guess I’ve been dreaming of this for so long it doesn’t seem real when you say it.”

“Stop being so overdramatic, idiot.”

“Only if you kiss me again.”

He kissed him.

“You seem really tired. Get some more sleep.”

Tooru nodded and curled up under the covers.

“I’m gonna go to work, all right? And tonight I’ll break things off with Michiko.”

“Just like that? She’s going to be furious.”

“She’ll probably punch me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. It’s not your fault.”

“I’m just too pretty.”

Hajime put his hand on Tooru’s head and shoved him into the pillow.

“Shut up.”

“Seriously, though. I’m sorry.”

“I know. It won’t be easy. But it’ll be fine. You’ll have it hard though, too. With Ushiwaka.”

“Right.”

“Fuck, that’s gonna be weird at work.”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry, I’ll let you sleep. I won’t say anything to Ushiwaka.”

“Thanks.”

He placed one last kiss on Tooru’s temple and said, “Love you.”

“I love you, too.”

When Hajime was gone, Gemini made her way back into the bedroom, back onto the bed, back into Tooru’s arms. And then he sobbed into her fur, because he couldn’t stop thinking about the way Wakatoshi Ushijima kissed his fingers.

 

* * *

 

Tooru was on Ushiwaka’s couch, glasses on, working on his composition. Tap, tap, tapping his pencil against the notebook. When he’d managed to get himself out of bed, wash up, take Gemini on a walk, call Ushiwaka, his mind had been completely riddled with inspiration. He took medicine and pain-relievers just so that he could sit and write without excessive discomfort. He hadn’t felt this much inspiration in so long—every time he told himself to take a break, grab a drink or a snack, another burst of energy came through his fingers, to the pencil, and onto the page. He’d been working for hours now. At around five, he got a phone call, and it was the first moment his work had been interrupted all afternoon.

“Hello?”

“Hi. Are you feeling better?”

“Loads better. Are you...almost done with work?”

“No, I’ll still be here for a few hours.”

“Okay. No rush.”

“But I wanted to tell you—I made reservations tonight, at that Italian restaurant you love.”

“What? Seriously? That’s so expensive, Ushiwaka-chan.”

“I know. I want to talk to you about something serious.”

_Fuck._

“Okay. I want to talk to you about something serious, too.”

“Perfect. We can leave once I get home.”

“O-okay.”

Almost as soon as Ushiwaka hung up, he received another call. This time from Hajime.

“Hi,” he said, his voice shaking.

“Hey. How you holding up?”

“Horribly, but it’s fine.”

“I called Michiko and told her to meet me after work.”

“Do you think she suspects anything?”

“Probably not.”

Tooru laughed.

“What’s so fucking funny?”

“I’m trying to imagine how I would feel if my fiancé called off the wedding three months before.”

“You’re...not helping.”

“I know, I know. Sorry.”

“You’re right, though. I’m in for a rough night.”

“So is she.”

“I don’t wanna think about it.”

“Then you’re an asshole.”

“Is that a surprise?”

“No. I’m an asshole, too. We’re meant to be.”

“Did you—?”

“Before I could even say anything, he told me he wants to talk about something serious.”

“Look at that. Maybe you’re off the hook.”

“I highly doubt that.”

“Knowing him, you’re right.”

“I’ll call you tomorrow morning. That okay?”

“Sure. If you need anything, though...”

“I know. Go catch some baddies.”

“All right. Love you.”

“I love you, too.”

It was surreal, hearing Hajime say that. And say it first.

But Tooru couldn’t feel the ecstasy he was supposed to be feeling, because he had Ushiwaka’s heart in his hands and he was about to squeeze it dry.


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20**

        Ushiwaka deserved the best, so Tooru dressed really nicely for their date, and put in his contact lenses (he’d gotten used to wearing his glasses out). He put on a really nice shirt, nice cigarette pants, combed his hair perfectly and put on his nice cologne. Even put on his nice expensive watch. When Ushiwaka came to pick him up from the apartment, he grabbed him tenderly by the waist and kissed his cheek as they stood in front of the mirror. The very epitome of perfection, the two of them standing beside each other.

        “You smell good,” he said.

        “Obviously.”

        “I’ll be ready in a few.”

        He kissed his cheek again, squeezed his waist, then disappeared into his bedroom. Tooru turned over his shoulder to watch his broad back as he left. Wakatoshi Ushijima was so filled with love, honesty, strength. Not a lot of tact, not a lot of charm, but Tooru had learned in his time loving Ushiwaka that those things didn’t always have to matter. He thought about jumping after him, grabbing his hand, pulling him back and kissing him as hard as he possibly could. But that would have been completely and utterly unfair, so he just looked back at his reflection and smiled at himself.

        When they walked in, Tooru was hanging on Ushiwaka’s arm like he was a lifesaver. Suddenly he was afraid of what was going to happen tonight. He was afraid of leaving Ushiwaka, even more afraid of the possibility that Ushiwaka wanted to leave him. (That was preposterous, of course. Ushiwaka would have given up everything to be with Tooru.) They sat down at the table, ordered some nice expensive wine, and fell into their usual conversation. Casual, easy, very much one-sided even if Ushiwaka couldn’t notice. He’d never been the most perceptive, and Tooru had always been the opposite. There was almost no indication, throughout the entirety of the dinner, that Ushiwaka had even prefaced with an impending serious conversation. But Tooru could hardly hide how tense he was, how on edge, because this was it. The last time they’d have a dinner like this, talk like this, brush their legs under the table like this, because Tooru was going to leave him for Hajime. I’m sorry, Ushiwaka-chan, but last night I fucked your partner and as it turns out I’ve never really loved you to begin with, thank you for everything.

        “You seem tense,” he said after they’d ordered dessert. He couldn’t help but reach across the table and grasp Ushiwaka’s hand, like a horrible, sneaky little con man. “Is everything okay?”

        “I...yes. Everything’s perfectly fine.”

        “Long day?”

        “Yes.” As if to calm himself, Ushiwaka brought Tooru’s hand up to his lips. “Thank you for asking.”

        “You mentioned that you wanted to talk about something serious,” Tooru said with a raise of his eyebrows.

        “Y...Yes.”

        Ushiwaka suddenly turned away and squeezed Tooru’s hand a bit harder.

        “Wakatoshi...?”

        “It seems my courage has left me. I thought I’d be able to do it here, but I can’t. Could we...wait until we get home?”

        “If that’s what you want,” Tooru shrugged dispassionately. “Makes the entire dinner a bit useless though.”

        “I don’t think so.”

        Tooru didn’t reply. He just watched Ushiwaka plant another kiss on his hand. Now he was impatient and restless and full, and he didn’t want dessert. Somehow reading his mind, Ushiwaka suggested they just get the check. Tooru insisted that they split it. So they did. Then, hand-in-hand, they left the restaurant, walked around a little bit, and when Ushiwaka offered to drive Tooru back to his house, Tooru refused, saying he wanted to be at Ushiwaka’s apartment today. So they hailed a cab back to the apartment, and Tooru, tired and sad, rested his head on Ushiwaka’s lap in the backseat. He wanted to feel this one last time.

        They walked inside, turned on the lights, took off their shoes and their jackets. Tooru sat down on the couch, like a king, and waited. Ushiwaka hung around the doorway, then the kitchen, then shuffled around with his hands in his pockets, wading in uncertainty. Tooru watched him beneath shimmering eyelashes.

        “Ushiwaka,” he called. He tried to put more tenderness into his voice. It was the least he could do. “Ushiwaka, come here.”

        A slave, Ushiwaka obeyed. Sat down beside Tooru on the couch, but didn’t remove his hands from his pockets. Tooru reached up to fix Ushiwaka’s collar.

        “What is so serious that you couldn’t even talk about it in public?”

        “You said you wanted to talk about something, too.”

        “You first.”

        Ushiwaka took a deep breath, and finally looked up into Tooru’s eyes.

        “We haven’t been together very long, have we?”

        “What does that have to do with anything?”

        “Well...how long do you think it takes to know that you’re going to love someone for the rest of your life?”

        _Fuck, I should’ve gone first._

“I don’t know. It depends.”

        Moonlight Sonata was playing in Tooru’s head, but it was twisted and distorted.

        “I tried not to think about it. I tried to tell myself that we were going too fast. That I’m losing my mind a little bit.”

        “Maybe you are.”

        “Probably. But it doesn’t change how I feel.”

        And then it happened. Tooru’s worst nightmare became a reality, as Ushiwaka dropped to one knee in front of him on the couch and pulled a small box from his pocket. Tooru caught his breath and held it—maybe if he held it long enough, he’d knock himself out.

        _C-sharp minor. Tobio-chan will like this. Not too hard. I’ll teach him this one next._

“Tooru Oikawa. I love you more than I ever thought I could love anyone, and I’ll love you for the rest of my life. I want you to marry me.”

        The wedding band was simple, elegant, beautiful. Tooru stared at it. Heart sinking, then floating, then twisting and turning.

        “Wakatoshi...”

        His eyes were so wide and imploring, not narrow and cold like they usually were. In the face of Tooru’s silence, his face didn’t fall even a little bit. His one hand holding the box, his other grabbed Tooru’s. The earnestness always cut through Tooru like a knife, and today the knife was hot and seared through him. For a split second, Tooru wanted to say yes. He wanted to abandon everything about himself and give his soul entirely to this boy, this boy who wanted him more than anybody had ever wanted anything. He looked at Tooru so lovingly, and Tooru couldn’t imagine anything better than spending his life being looked at like that.

But then Tooru thought--inevitably--about Hajime Iwaizumi and the fire that burned in his heart for him. He thought about how long he’d been in love with Hajime, how long he had pined after him before they’d finally confessed to each other that night over six years ago. He thought about the broken heart, so broken, barely glued together by the piano he spent his days playing, when he’d lost Hajime. He thought about the notebook filled with memories, images, dreams of Hajime. Tooru had done nothing but play piano and think about Hajime Iwaizumi. And now they were going to be together. They were going to love each other the way they’d always meant to love each other.

The only thing in Tooru’s way was this boy, on his knee, asking him to marry him.

        Tooru put his hand on Ushiwaka’s cheek and stroked with his thumb the line beneath his large, round eye.

        “I need you to know that you’ve made these past few months bearable. Some of the best of my life,” he said. As soon as the words left his lips, Ushiwaka’s face fell, and he lowered the box. “Having you there for me has meant more than you’ll ever know.”

        Tooru had been ready for this. He really had been. If this was what he had to do to be with Hajime, so be it. (The only reason he had done it in the first place was for the simple fact that he couldn’t be with Hajime.) But watching the light leaving Ushiwaka’s eyes—that, he hadn’t been ready for. He grabbed Ushiwaka’s face with both hands and leaned forward. Tooru was the most horrible person in the world.

        “I can’t marry you,” he murmured. Ushiwaka stared up into his eyes.

        “Why not?” His voice shook as Tooru had never heard it shake before.

        “Because I don’t deserve your love. Marrying you wouldn’t be fair to you.”

        “I...I don’t understand. I don’t understand. I don’t care if you don’t deserve it, I want to give it to you.”

        “I can’t take it from you when I have nothing to give back.”

        “Nothing to give back?” Ushiwaka bent down and pressed his forehead to Tooru’s knees. Held his legs desperately. “You’ve given me everything I ever needed.”

        “No I haven’t. I haven’t given you anything.”

        “I don’t understand,” he repeated, voice muffled against Tooru’s legs. He was all of a sudden like a child, holding onto Tooru desperately, clinging, hiding tears that Tooru had known were inevitable.

        He wished his heart were breaking more, but Hajime’s hands kept it tightly together.

        “I don’t understand. I love you so much.”

        “I know. I know you do.” He leaned down and pressed his lips into Ushiwaka’s hair. “And I can’t love you back.”

        “What do you need from me? Just tell me what you need. Tell me who you need me to be. I’ll be that person for you.”

        His fingers gripped Tooru’s legs like claws. His big, broad body trembled.

        “You can’t give me anything you haven’t already given me, Wakatoshi.”

        “Then why? Why is this happening?”

        “I’m in love with someone else,” he said bluntly.

        Wakatoshi’s body quivered, and he lifted his head up. Tooru held it, wiped the tears that had slipped from his eyes.

        “It’s what I wanted to tell you. If I had known—”

        “You’re in love with someone else?” he repeated in disbelief. Tooru nodded. “For how long?”

        “My entire life.”

        He narrowed his eyes and Tooru felt nothing.

        “This whole time...”

        Tooru nodded.

        “Will you tell me who it is?”

        “It’s Iwaizumi.”

        Ushiwaka stared for a few moments, then let his head fall back down into Tooru’s lap.

        “I’m sorry I couldn’t be enough for you,” he murmured.

        That made Tooru angry. It made him furious.

        “Stop it. It’s not about you. Okay? It’s not about you at all. Why do you keep blaming yourself for things you never did? For not being enough for me, or whatever...you literally could not have been better to me. Why aren’t you angry at me? Why aren’t you yelling at me for...for pretending to be in love you with this whole time?”

        “Because I don’t care.”

        “You don’t _care_?”

        “I don’t care. You can do whatever you want to me. Say whatever you want. It won’t stop me from loving you.”

        “Why do you insist on making things hard on yourself?”

        “Because when I’m with you, I don’t exist anymore.”

        Tooru joined Ushiwaka down on the floor, wrapped his arms around Ushiwaka’s neck, and held him. Held him close and let him cry.

        “Stop thinking like that. Stop living your life for me. Stop convincing yourself that you love me so much you would sacrifice everything.”

        “I’m not convincing myself of that. It’s just true. I love you more than I could ever love myself.”

        “I’m sorry, Wakatoshi.”

        _I destroyed you._

He held him really, really tightly. And for the first time, Tooru saw Wakatoshi Ushijima cry.

        “I hope you can forgive me, because you mean so much to me.”

        “Of course I forgive you. You never have to ask for my forgiveness.”

        “God, I wish you hated me.”

        “Me, too.”

        “But you’ll never hate me.”

        “No. Never.”

 

* * *

 

        A week later. Tobio was sitting at Tooru’s piano, reading through the first page of Moonlight Sonata. Tooru watched his face, scrunched up in concentration, as he ingested the key, the time signature, the themes, everything.

        “Excited, Tobio-chan?”

        He nodded silently, holding his bubbles over the piano. The more Tobio learned, the more he wanted to learn; and the more he competed, the more he wanted to compete. He’d swept every competition he’d ever done, and was starting to make a name for himself in the musical community of Tokyo. Especially now that he had Tooru’s help, one of the most renowned pianists of all time, he was sure to gain ridiculous success. But Tooru didn’t want that to happen right away. He wanted to give Tobio a chance to have a normal childhood, of the kind that Tooru himself never had. He didn’t want Tobio spending days in hospitals because he was encouraged to sit at the piano for hours without water or food.

        But he couldn’t say that he wasn’t distracted. For the past few days, Tooru had had his hands full being the pillar of support that Hajime needed. His break with Michiko had been rough, understandably. So when Hajime had asked Tooru if he was okay, Tooru had lied and said yes. That he didn’t need to talk about it, was already over it, that it wasn’t a big deal. The fact of the matter was that Tooru was tortured. Without the constant communication with Ushiwaka that he was so accustomed to, the support, the affection, the intimacy, the comfort whenever he needed it, there was terrible emptiness. And it wasn’t as if Hajime couldn’t fill that emptiness. Hajime was everything that Tooru had ever wanted. Literally. But things with Ushiwaka had been different and he was getting used to this absence and it was terrible.

        But he couldn’t bother Hajime with that. Not when Hajime was having so much trouble dealing with Michiko. Cancelled wedding plans. The pain of it all. He’d been with Michiko much longer than Tooru had been with Ushiwaka.

        It was reassuring, though, that the partner dynamic between Hajime and Ushiwaka hadn’t been affected. They were as good as before.

        Tobio began to play the first measure, but Tooru lifted a hand to stop him.

        “No, no, darling. What do you have to do first?”

        “I’m sorry, Oikawa-sensei.”

        He played through the c-sharp minor scale, fingers small and smooth.

        “Good boy. Now play the first measure for me. Just the first measure.”

        Tobio nodded, then played the first measure. Technically, it was perfect.

        “Again.”

        He played the first measure again.

        “Second measure.”

        He played the second measure.

        “Beethoven must have been really sad,” Tobio said softly.

        “Why do you say that, Tobio-chan?”

        “Because this is sad.”

        “You don’t need to be sad to write something sad.”

        “I guess not.” Tobio poked at the c-sharp key. “Still. I think he was sad.”

        “Beethoven was pretty sad, actually. You know he went deaf?”

        Tobio stared up at Tooru with wide, curious eyes.

        “He went deaf? Then how’d he compose music?”

        Tooru shrugged, leaned his elbow on the piano, and tucked a strand of black hair behind Tobio’s ear.

        “He was a genius. He didn’t need to hear the music to know how it sounded.”

        “That’s amazing.”

        “Right? Did you know at the premiere of his ninth symphony, he had his back turned to the crowd, and he couldn’t hear everybody clapping for him. So one of the singers had to turn him around so he could see.”

        Tobio gawked.

        “Did he cry?” he whispered. Tooru thought for a moment.

        “I don’t know. Probably.”

        “I would’ve cried.”

        Tooru smiled.

        “How about you hold back those tears and just play the piece, Tobio-chan.”

        “Yes, Oikawa-sensei.”

        They went through the first page meticulously, until Tooru was confident that Tobio had committed it to memory. It only took him about forty-five minutes. His mind was absurd. Before Koushi arrived to pick him up, when Tooru was writing down in Tobio’s little notebook all the things he needed to work on, Tobio spoke.

        “Is Detective-san here?”

        “Detective-san?” Tooru replied, without looking up from the notebook. “Why do you want to see Detective-san?”

        “I want to ask him a question.”

        “Why don’t you just ask me, Tobio-chan?”

        “Because I need to ask a detective.”

        “Just tell me.”

        “Somebody pushed Shouyou on the playground. I want to ask Detective-san to arrest him.”

        Tooru looked up, raising his eyebrows. Tobio, relentless, stared back at him.

        “Detectives don’t arrest children for pushing other children.”

        “How do you know? You’re not a detective, Oikawa-sensei.”

        “I just know.”

        “Detective-san isn’t here?”

        “No, Tobio-chan, Detective-san isn’t here.”

        “Well...when is he gonna be here?”

        “Never, Tobio-chan.”

        “But I thought he was your partner.”

        “He’s not. Not anymore.”

        “How come?”

        “Because he’s just not.”

        “Why?”

        “Stop meddling in other people’s business, Tobio-chan! It’s very rude.”

        He’d snapped. Tobio’s cheeks flushed bright red, and he flinched, curled into himself. Shoulders slouched, lower lip trembling, fingers wringing and shaking.

        “I...I’m sorry, Oikawa-sensei.”

        Tooru squeezed his eyes shut, rubbed his temples, and then pulled Tobio into his chest. Cradled his head gently.

        “No, no. It’s okay, Tobio-chan. It’s not your fault.”

        “Are you sad, too, Oikawa-sensei?” he asked. He was grasping Tooru’s shirt.

        “Just a little bit.”

        “I’m sorry Detective-san isn’t your partner anymore.”

        “Shh. It’s okay.”

        He kissed the top of Tobio’s head, and then the doorbell rang.  


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

“Do you remember when we were on the playground in first grade and I fell off the jungle gym? I scraped my knee, and you started bossing people around, telling one kid to tell the teacher, another kid to get bandages...”

“I remember. I was so terrified, I’d never seen a cut like that before.”

“None of us could tell you were scared at all. You were so smooth and authoritative.”

“I’ve always been a good actor, haven’t I?”

“And I was just sitting there laughing, because I knew it wasn’t a big deal, but I knew you would get upset if I told you that.”

Tooru reached up and clung to Hajime’s neck like a baby monkey and kissed his bare chest. It was late—a little past midnight. But these hours were the only time that Hajime and Tooru had together. Hajime, even more than Ushiwaka, was married to his work. He rarely took days off and had racked up an absurd number of vacation days, always went into work despite sickness, was the first into the precinct and the last to leave almost every day. Late at night, sleepy and weary, exhausted, starved for touch and intimacy, were the moments that Tooru and Hajime had to love each other. Which was why most nights they were at Hajime’s apartment. Which was why most nights, Tooru massaged Hajime’s shoulders, kissed him and touched him in forgotten places, why most nights they talked and loved until late, late, late at night. (Which in turn was why Hajime was running on so little sleep. Tooru tried to get him to sleep more, but Hajime claimed that he couldn’t with Tooru running his mouth all night.)

Hajime was still recovering from the terrible break with Michiko. The emotional, social, and economic ramifications were just as bad as they’d been expecting, and he was hurting. Tooru tried to heal him without revealing that he needed healing, too—after all, Hajime didn’t really need to do anything special to help Tooru heal. Holding him, kissing him, telling him he loved him was everything Tooru needed to heal. Looking up and seeing Hajime’s cheek pressed to the pillow, black paintbrush eyelashes fluttering up and down, fingers absentmindedly stroking Tooru’s shoulder. The languor in his eyes, the messiness of his hair, the scars on his skin and the overwhelming beauty of his limbs moving and stretching in the twilit shadows. This was all Tooru needed to heal.

“I liked to think I was in control, even then,” Tooru grinned. He was obsessed with the feeling of Hajime’s index finger twirling a strand of his curling chocolate hair.

“You were in control. Everybody listened to you without even questioning it.”

“I needed to be.”

“Control freak.”

Tooru stuck his tongue out at him, and Hajime stuck his tongue back. Then he leaned forward and swallowed it with a slow, lustful kiss.

“Not so controlling now, hmm?” he teased in hushed tones.

“I guess you’re the exception, I-wa-cha-an~.”

Hajime took the invitation and rolled Tooru over onto his back. He settled himself between his hips and kissed him heavily, burying his hands in his hair and pushing against his crotch. Tooru gripped Hajime’s warm wrists, wrapped his legs around his waist, and pulled him in tighter. Until sweet, stomach-churning pleasure spread from between his legs and up to the moan in his lips. When his mouth opened, Hajime grinned, traced the line of Tooru’s wide, wet lips with his tongue, taunted him so cruelly. Then he clamped his teeth gently down on Tooru’s lower lip. Sucked, and, made thirsty, kissed him as if his life depended on it.

“If you fell off a jungle gym today,” Tooru murmured, moving his hips with Hajime’s slow thrusts, “I’d be just as terrified.”

“You’re so...ah, you’re so full of it.”

“If you got a paper cut, from filing or making copies or handing out parking tickets, I’d be terrified, too.”

“I don’t give out parking tickets.”

“Never?”

“Not anymore.”

Hajime began to kiss Tooru’s neck, sucking hard on the spots he knew Tooru felt the most pleasure. Saw the most white when he closed his eyes.

“Mm, Hajime,” he purred, pressing his palms down into Hajime’s back. “You have a pair of handcuffs?”

Hajime pulled away, propped himself up on his hands, looked down at Tooru with a sly, crooked smile. Tooru blinked slowly back up at him.

“Handcuffs?”

“Yeah.” Tooru licked his lips and fell deeper into the bed. “Haven’t you always _dreamed_ of arresting me? Punishing me for all my crimes?”

Hajime smiled, amused and turned on and hungry, and pressed his palm gently against Tooru’s neck. He lowered himself down, down, until his lips were right above Tooru’s.

“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”

“I know my rights, Detective.” He arched his head back and offered his wrists to Hajime. “Though...I don’t think I’ll be able to remain silent.”

Hajime kissed him, grabbed his wrists, and violently pinned them down to the bed. Pushing his tongue as deep as it would go down Tooru’s vulnerable throat.

“Then your ass is mine,” he hissed. Lighting Tooru’s body on fire.

“Go ahead and take it.”

“Don’t move.”

With one last kiss, Hajime hopped off the bed and stumbled, nearly tripping on Gemini, as he ran out of the bedroom. Tooru waited, spread out like a sacrifice on the bed, and listened to Hajime’s body moving through the slick darkness. His wrists were aching for pressure now. After about a minute, Tooru heard metal clanking against metal, and in the next moment Hajime was clambering back onto the bed with a pair of handcuffs in his hands.

“You have keys, right?” Tooru asked. Hajime grinned as he crawled toward him.

“Yeah.”

“How about a gun?”

He shook his head.

“We’re not using a gun.”

“Just wondering if you have one, that’s all.”

Hajime didn’t respond. Instead, he held the handcuffs in the air and shook them.

“Onto your stomach.”

“Yes, Detective.”

Tooru, being purposefully slow and dramatic, turned onto his stomach. He felt Hajime’s body moving over his, pushing him down into the bed, felt him harshly grab one of his wrists. He clamped the cold, hard handcuff over his wrists, and Tooru grit his teeth in anticipation. This was a strange fantasy he’d had for a while and he was indescribably happy that Hajime had agreed. Without much of a fight, too. After cuffing just one hand, Hajime began running his hand softly, tauntingly, down Tooru’s spine. His back arched down like a stretching cat and his lips let out a long, breathy exhale. Hajime leaned down and put his lips between Tooru’s shoulder blades, making him relax, settle into position, groan. Then, Hajime grabbed Tooru’s other hand, lifted both above his head, and cuffed the second one. On his stomach, hands cuffed above his head, Tooru was completely in Hajime’s control.

“Feeling okay?”

He bent down until his chest was pressed to Tooru’s back and his voice was in his ear. Tooru nodded, leaning in toward Hajime’s cigarette-smoke voice. Hajime ran his hands up along Tooru’s handcuffed arms and kissed the corner of his open lips. Moved to kiss his temple, his cheek, traced his ear with his tongue and bit his earlobe. All while he pushed Tooru’s wrists down into the bed.

“Ha-ahh-jime,” Tooru cooed, voice muffled against the bedsheets.

Hajime buried his face against the back of Tooru’s neck, mapped it out in excruciatingly erotic detail with his tongue, and reached his hands down beneath Tooru’s body. He ran his palms, calloused and rough, along Tooru’s chest, while his tongue traversed his skin. The sweet pleasure, combined with the tense, almost painful position he was in and the handcuffs around, was making Tooru slowly go wild. He tried to muffle his whimpering, breathy voice against the sheets, but it was spilling out without his control. Got louder when Hajime’s thumb ran up against his erect nipple, pressed, twisted. His other hand moved lower, over his stomach, and then lower. As his fingers wrapped around Tooru’s semi-hard cock, he groaned against his skin, and pushed his cuffed wrists harder into the bed.

Tooru moaned louder when Hajime moved his wrist, pushed his cock into the bed, breathed short and ragged into Tooru’s ear.

“God, Ha—!” His words were cut off when Hajime sped up, and Tooru bit down on his lower lip and shook his cuffed wrists. His body moved with Hajime, swayed, found twisted pleasure in not being able to move his arms. In only being able to shake his wrists in those cuffs. The metal clanking echoed in his mind. The pleasure spread from between his legs and made his entire body tingle, made his lips open and his toes curl and his limbs tremble. He wanted to sink into the bed, wanted Hajime to swallow him with his thick tongue and chapped lips, curl him into a ball with his sensitive, nimble fingertips.

Hajime slowed down and moved his hand from Tooru’s cock, up along his body, back up to his throat. Until his thumb was caressing, threateningly, his chin. Tooru was desperate now, panting, and he stretched his tongue out to touch the tip of Hajime’s thumb. Hajime laughed, low and rough, into Tooru’s ear and moved his fingers up into his eager mouth. Tooru took in those fingers, wrapped his tongue around them, sucked on them like lollipops. He wanted Hajime to push them in further, but he couldn’t grab his hand because his were cuffed, so he just leaned his head further and took in as much as he could. He moaned and licked and sucked and Hajime laughed into his ear again.

“Fuck, Tooru,” he whispered.

“Mm.” He opened his mouth and Hajime withdrew his fingers. “Getting a little hot and bothered, Detective?”

“Shut your mouth.”

“Make me.”

He shoved Tooru’s face into the bedsheets and spread his legs. Tooru heard what he assumed was the sound of Hajime ripping open a condom wrapper, slipping the condom on. He moaned purely from the anticipation—perhaps partly from the cuffs digging into his wrists. In the next moment, his cheeks were being spread, and he felt the head of Hajime’s cock. Still pressed down against Tooru, he pushed in, further, spurred on by the reaction of Tooru’s body. He began to thrust, slow and shallow at first, one hand pressed into Tooru’s waist and the other pushing his cuffed wrists into the pillows. His grip became harder, rougher, as he began to move faster, hot breaths setting fire to Tooru’s spine.

They had done this enough times that Hajime knew exactly where Tooru’s sweet spot was. His dick brushed up against Tooru’s prostate and he cried out, more loudly than he meant, as he was blinded. Again and again, Hajime hit that spot, making Tooru dizzy and hot, making his body twist and turn in the sheets. Until finally, they reached the top together, drowning in the other’s voice. In the feel of their touches and their breaths and their terrifying pleasure.

They fell asleep almost immediately after they were done, tangled up in a mess under the (changed) covers. There were slight red marks on Tooru’s wrists and as he fell asleep, Hajime massaged his wrists and kissed the marks.

“Sorry if I hurt you,” he whispered against Tooru’s palms. Tooru shook his head.

“You’re a fantastic detective.”

“I don’t need you to tell me that, Shittykawa.”

“So mean.”    

 

* * *

Tooru knew Wakatoshi needed space so he didn’t contact him for a while—but he told Hajime to tell Wakatoshi that if he ever needed anything, to give Tooru a call.

“I don’t think he’ll want to hear that from me, but I’ll tell him,” Hajime said.

 

* * *

 

“Play Moonlight Sonata for me.”

“Yes, Oikawa-sensei.”

Tobio took a deep breath, positioned his hands, and began to play. He still wasn’t as relaxed as Tooru would have liked him to be. And he’d been working with Tooru for months at this point, knew him and loved him, and the fact that he was tense around someone like Tooru meant that he needed more practice relaxing. It had been a constant point of critique during his competitions, despite win after win after win. As he played, the music slow and deep and warm, Tooru nodded and watched Tobio’s fingers. They were a bit stiff. Then he looked at his face. His eyebrows were scrunched together, lips tucked in, eyes hard. His entire body was tense, but the music was beautiful regardless. It could be even more beautiful.

After he’d played the last note, he dutifully lifted his hands, put them into his lap, relaxed his face, and turned to his piano teacher.

“Good job, Tobio-chan. That was very good.”

“Thank you, Oikawa-sensei.”

“But you’re so tense. You need to relax a little bit.”

Tobio gave Tooru a very confused expression.

“You play as if you’re about to go to war,” Tooru laughed. “If you stay that tense, you’ll never be able to play as beautifully as I know you can.”

“I don’t...understand.”

“Here.” Tooru stood up and walked up behind Tobio. Tobio positioned his hands on the piano, and Tooru touched his elbows gently. “Smooth, smooth. Don’t tense your arms up. There you go.”

Tobio’s playing became a bit smoother.

“Dance with the piano, darling. After this chord, lift your hand up—here, like this—” Here, he forced Tobio’s elbow up high. “Good, good. Let your hand float. The shape of a rainbow.”

His playing became a tad more dramatic as he interpreted the piece in a deeper way.

“Wonderful. But don’t compromise technicality for looseness. Combine them both to play it correctly, but smoothly.”

“Technipality?”

“Technicality, Tobio-chan. It means that you play the specific notes right.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“Try it by yourself now, okay?”

“Yes, Oikawa-sensei.”

He sat back down in the chair, listening to the so much improved playing, and grabbed Tobio’s piano notebook to write down the pieces of advice he’d just given him. And he realized that he could hardly hold the pen. His hands were flaring up, his fingers red and swollen. He struggled with a few characters before he had to take a deep breath and stop. Tobio—children were always more perceptive than people gave them credit for—noticed Tooru’s change in character. He made a mistake in his playing, and used it as an excuse to stop.

“What’s the matter, Tobio-chan? Tired?”

“Are you okay, Oikawa-sensei?”

“Hmm? Me? What makes you ask?”

“Your hands. They’re all red.”

“Oh. It’s nothing, darling, don’t worry.”

Tobio held his hand out expectantly, a determined look in his dark blue eyes. Tooru couldn’t help but relent; he let Tobio hold his hand.

“Your hands are warm.” He pouted. “Does it hurt?”

“Yes. Quite a lot.”

“Is that why you can’t play for me sometimes?”

“Yes.”

“How do you fix it?”

“I can’t. I just take a medicine so it hurts a little bit less.”

“Oh.” Tobio was playing absentmindedly with Tooru’s warm, red fingers. “Suga told me that you’re really famous, Oikawa-sensei.”

“Did he?”

Tobio nodded.

“He said you’ve played in lots of big concert halls. Not just in Japan, but everywhere.”

“Suga’s right. I used to travel a lot.”

“Did you play for lots of people?”

“I did.”

“What kind of things did you play?”

“All sorts of things.”

“Beethoven?”

“Of course.”

“Rachanam...”

“Rachmaninoff. Yes. All sorts of things.”

“Did you like it?”

“I loved it.”

“More than you love teaching me?”

Tooru smiled tenderly, and pinched Tobio’s cheek.

“Of course not, Tobio-chan.”

“Do you think I’ll get to play like that one day?”

“Yes. I do.”

“Will you come watch me?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world, darling.”

Tobio smiled.

“When I have a boo-boo, Suga kisses it for me, and it always makes it feel better.”

“Is that right?”

“Maybe if I kiss your boo-boo, it’ll feel better. And you can play again.”

“Worth a shot, then, isn’t it?”

Tobio nodded vehemently, then gently kissed the back of Tooru’s hand.

“Does it feel better yet, Oikawa-sensei?”

“A million times better. Now stop getting distracted and play me Moonlight Sonata again.”

“Yes, Oikawa-sensei.”


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**

Tooru and Tobio were in the middle of a lesson, around the middle of November, when they heard the front door open. Tobio stopped playing, but Tooru told him it was nothing and to keep going. Tobio, distracted, did as he was told. A few weeks ago, Tooru had given Hajime an extra key to the house, so he knew it was him—but he was surprised. It was the middle of the day, and Hajime never came over much anyway. He was too busy most of the time. So Tooru was a bit worried that Hajime had shown up at four o’clock in the afternoon without any warning. (Just to be sure, Tooru snuck a peek at his phone. Sure enough, there were no texts or calls from Hajime.) Something must have happened at work, but Tooru forced the thoughts, the concerns, out of his head. Tobio needed his attention right now.

But his attention was forcibly ripped away when the door to the piano room was thrown open. Tobio flinched, and Tooru stood up so quickly that his chair fell over. He whirled around to find Hajime in the doorway, breathing heavy, head low.

“Hajime! I’m in the middle of a—!”

Hajime stormed across the room and, without even a word of explanation, wrapped his arms around Tooru’s neck and held him so tightly that Tooru gasped for breath.

“H...Hajime,” he hissed through gritted teeth. “Now is _hardly_ the time.”

“Just shut up and let me hold you for a second, all right?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Tooru saw Tobio, nervous and uncomfortable, sitting with his hands wringing in his lap. He reached up and held Hajime, felt Hajime’s nose crushed against his neck, felt his body trembling. His anger subsided for a moment—he’d never seen Hajime like this. Shaken up, this aggressively desperate to be held. So Tooru held him despite the little boy suddenly feeling very forgotten on the piano bench.

“I can’t talk now. Go make yourself a cup of coffee, smoke a few cigarettes. I have to finish my lesson,” he murmured quietly.

“Yeah. Yeah, sorry.”

Hajime finally let go, looked appreciatively and lovingly into Tooru’s eyes, flashed a trembling smile in Tobio’s direction, and left the room. When Tooru looked back at Tobio, he was staring after Hajime with wide-eyed amazement and a slight red flush in his cheeks. Tooru sat back down and pinched his cheek.

“Sorry about that, darling.”

“Who was that?”

“My friend Iwaizumi.”

“Oh.”

“He’s a detective, too.”

“Is he, like...your new partner?”

Tooru raised his eyebrows, always astonished at how perceptive children even as young as Tobio could be.

“I suppose so.”

“Do you love him?”

“I do.”

Tobio smiled, so Tooru smiled back. Then he took on a stern expression.

“Back to playing.”

“Yes, Oikawa-sensei.”

Tobio snapped back into position and started to play again, but Tooru could tell that he was hiding a smile the whole time.

 

* * *

 

When Tooru shut the door behind Koushi and Tobio, he took a deep breath and pressed his forehead to the door. Hajime was waiting for him, probably roaming around the living room and smoking through a full packet. He was trying to reconcile his irritation, his curiosity, and his worry so that he could deal with whatever was to come patiently and maturely. Both traits in which Tooru was notoriously lacking. He took another deep breath and went down the hallway, back to the vast living room. When he walked in, he paused by the staircase. Hajime was standing at the far side of the room, next to the fireplace Tooru used during winter. He was staring outside the window, one hand on his hip, the other bringing the cigarette to and from his lips. Hand trembling as Tooru had never seen it tremble. He moved forward.

“At least open the window if you’re gonna be smoking so much,” he said quietly. Hajime turned just a bit.

“Sorry.”

“And what possessed you into thinking it was okay to interrupt me in the middle of a lesson? Tobio-chan’s, no less.”

Hajime didn’t respond, and turned back to the window. Tooru flashed back to how tightly he had held him, almost crushed his bones, and he felt ravaging pangs of concern.

“Hajime.” He walked up to him, wrapped his hands around his back, pressed his palms to his chest and his forehead to the back of his neck. “What’s wrong?”

“Sorry I burst in like that,” Hajime apologized. His voice was low and gruff. Hoarse, fatigued, weary. Tooru kissed his bronze, clammy skin. “I just...I needed to.”

“Come here. Sit down and tell me what’s wrong. I promise I won’t yell at you anymore.”

It seemed like Hajime wasn’t processing his jokes. The couch shook like the entire earth when they sat down upon it. Hajime crushed his cigarette on a crystal ashtray that Tooru had always just used for show until now, and leaned his tired head on Tooru’s shoulder.

“I don’t know if I can do this anymore.”

“Do what?”

“This job. It’s...it’s getting to me.”

“I’m surprised it took you this long to feel this,” Tooru smiled. Stroked Hajime’s head like a child. “You’re stronger than most people just to get this far.”

“Today we had to talk to the husband of a woman who’d been raped and murdered. He discovered her body in their bedroom. Fuck, can you imagine what it must have been like for him? To walk into his home, his _home_ , and find the love of his life lying in a pool of blood? Completely maimed? Unrecognizable?”

“You see this type of stuff every day,” Tooru pointed out softly.

“I...I know. Maybe it shouldn’t have hit me so hard. I mean, I’ve seen worse. I have. But when I talked to him, the husband...and when I saw the body, I just...something snapped. I couldn’t stand to be there. Couldn’t stand to see it over and over and over again. Every time I close my eyes there’s a body. A rapist, a murderer, a serial killer. I held that man, that fucking grown man, while he cried like a baby on my shoulder. And I thought to myself, what would I do? If one day you were stolen from me and tortured like that. I would go mad.”

Tooru closed his eyes and kissed Hajime’s forehead. A silent way of showing him that he was there, and he wasn’t going anywhere.

“I could hardly stand. I thought I was gonna be sick. Ushiwaka told me to go home and said he would cover for me. Knowing that I was going to see you, the son of a bitch. You know how much of a piece of shit that made me feel like?”

“He’s kind to a fault, isn’t he?”

“He’s just stupid.”

Tooru smiled and, when Hajime began to shake, held him more tightly.

“Maybe I’m not cut out for this. Cuz it’s not like I can show these people, these victims, that I’m this weak. I have to be strong. If I’m not strong when these horrible things happen, if the person who’s supposed to save them can’t keep it together, then how the fuck are they supposed to do it?”

“You’re not weak.”

“Like when a rape victim says to me, Does it get better, and I have to lie and act like I know anything about it. How do I fucking know? All I do is clean up the messes. I don’t suffer the way they do. What right do I have to even feel this?”

“Stop that. You have a right to emotions just like everybody else. It’s natural for this to catch up with you, no matter how strong you are.”

“I have terrifying enemies.”

“You’re pretty terrifying, too.”

Finally, Hajime cracked a smile.

“Ushiwaka and I are pretty sure there are some nasty yakuza causing problems. There have been a few other rape murders in that neighborhood showing the same M.O.”

“You’re dealing with yakuza? Please be careful.”

“It’s fine. Like you said, I’m pretty terrifying. And Ushiwaka’s no puppy.”

“No. No he’s not.”

“Can you play something for me, please? If your fingers are okay.”

“Whatever you want. They’re okay today.”

“Piano Man.”

Tooru put another kiss to Hajime’s forehead and stood up to walk to the piano. Behind him, Hajime lay down on the couch and pulled a cushion to his chest. He, of course, kept the door to the piano room open. The way he did when he performed for guests. It was a big door. When he sat down on the bench, it felt like he was falling hundreds of feet down a cliff into a ravine of black and white piano keys, all out of tune. Something was changing in him, something was changing in Hajime, and it was terrifying. He started to play.

“It’s a pretty good crowd for a Saturday, and the manager gives me a smile. Cuz he knows that it’s me they’ve been coming to see, to forget about life for a while,” he sang. Hajime joined in.

“And the piano it sounds like a carnival, and the microphone smells like a beer. And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar, and say ‘Man, what are you doing here?’”

Tooru’s voice cracked, and he couldn’t sing the last chorus. So Hajime sang it alone, and Tooru heard him. The child that had sat beside him all those years ago, begging him to play it over and over and over because finally it was a song he could sing along to. A song they could sing together. He heard the Hajime that he had fallen in love with singing like a ten year-old who couldn’t understand the words, but needed to sing anyway, because his voice was desperate to fly.

“Sing us a song you’re the piano man. Sing us a song tonight. Well we’re all in the mood for a melody, and you’ve got us feeling all right.”

As the final notes rang out into the vast, lonely valley of Tooru’s house, he watched his crystal-clear tears splash like waterfalls down on the keys of the piano.

That night, while Hajime slept like a rock from sheer exhaustion, Tooru woke up with aches in his fingers and a slight fever. He managed to get out of bed, rubbing his hands gently together, and walk down to the kitchen. The water he drank was cool and refreshing on his throat, the pills harsh and heavy like anvils. His fever wasn’t terrible, so he figured he would just sleep it off. Just before sneaking back into bed, he checked his phone—something he’d always been told not to do (the light disturbs sleeping cycles, Tooru). Suddenly alert and bewildered by what he saw on the screen, he hurried back out of the room into the hallway. There was a missed call and voicemail from a number that he didn’t recognize. It wasn’t terribly late. Around one. First he listened to the voicemail.

“It’s Michiko. Hajime gave me your number. I really need to talk to you, so call me back when you get the chance.”

Heart falling, skin turning red with rage, Tooru deleted the voicemail and just stared at his screen for a few moments. She was the very last person he ever wanted to hear from, and to listen to her voice speaking slowly and smoothly into his message box made him inexplicably infuriated. Still, there was a part of him that was guilty and self-destructive, constantly reminding his more immature, oblivious parts that he had played a role in fucking up her relationship and future plans. So, ignoring the fact that it was one o’clock in the morning, Tooru called her back.

“Hello?” she answered. Expectantly.

“Hi, Michiko,” he replied evenly.

“Weird, isn’t it? You should really be calling me Mrs. Iwaizumi.”

“It’s not December yet.”

“Fair enough. Anyway, thanks for calling me back.”

“Curiosity killed the cat.”

“Satisfaction brought it back.”

“What do you want?”

“I want to talk to you.”

“So talk.”

“In person.”

“Why the hell would you want to do that?”

“Are you going to agree or not?”

Tooru paused. His chest was fluttering and his fingers might as well have been crumbling mountains, and he wanted so desperately to say no. But then he imagined her, standing before Hajime in complete disbelief as he told her that he didn’t want to marry her anymore. That he didn’t love her anymore. He imagined the tears rolling down her cheeks as she screamed about how unfair this was, how sudden, how utterly _wrong_. He imagined the pain that must have brought her to her knees, the swallowing emptiness and the cold, freezing loneliness that started sleeping with her at night. It was because of him.

“I suppose I owe you.”

“To say the least.”

She told him to meet her at one of the fancier cafés at noon, reassuring him that she would be waiting.

“I won’t be armed, don’t worry,” she added.

“I can’t promise the same.”

He heard her scoff before she hung up. Before Tooru went back to bed, he popped into his closet, just to make sure that he had done enough laundry to ensure a put-together suit for tomorrow.

 

* * *

 

The café was formal, almost absurdly so. In a sweater, blazer, nice pants, and glasses, Tooru walked inside and told the nearest waiter who he was looking for. There was a dark, smooth atmosphere, even though it was the middle of the day; sconces with fake candles lit up the walls, red tablecloths covered the tables, and there were almost no windows. It gave him a strange, secretive feeling. The waiter heard two words from Tooru’s mouth and gestured toward the back corner of the room. From where he stood, Tooru could see nothing but a silhouette sitting up against the wall, surrounded by smoke. He walked over.

Michiko was exquisite, in a fitted navy dress, pantyhose, slender navy heels. She had taken off her long, embroidered coat and hung it on the back of the chair. A string of pearls accentuated the vast openness of her graceful neck, with matching bracelets and small, elegant rings. Her thick, black hair was tied back into a sleek ponytail, and she wore bright red lipstick, with matching red nail polish. When Tooru approached the table, she was crushing a cigarette on the ashtray—so _that’s_ where Iwa-chan got his disgusting habit—and her gaze flickered up to him. There was a ring of red on the cigarette butt from her lipstick. As they locked eyes, he heard Mussorgsky’s “The Old Castle,” and he couldn’t for the life of him figure out why. She’d always seemed like a Mozart person.

“For a moment I wondered if you’d come,” she admitted as he slid into the seat across from her.

“I have no reason not to.”

“I’d say you have plenty.”

“Please.”

She grinned, one corner of her mouth moving slightly higher than the other. Tooru hadn’t spent a lot of time with Michiko, but he hadn’t remembered her being this shrewd. She had always struck him as lighthearted and frivolous, but he had to remind himself that she was a successful, renowned investigative journalist who had managed to win Hajime’s heart. Surely she had her secrets, her dark parts, just as Tooru did. The more he thought about it, the more their similarities frightened him.

Michiko lifted a hand to flag a waiter down.

“Two Americanos, please,” she said to him.

“Right away.”

“I hope you like Americano,” she said to Tooru. He didn’t respond, so she smiled again and pulled out another cigarette. “Relax. I didn’t ask you here to berate you, insult you, let you know that you ruined the only healthy relationship I’ve ever had.”

She took a drag and blew the smoke out into Tooru’s face.

“Is that so.”

“Absolutely. That wouldn’t help me in the slightest. Besides, it’s not as much your fault as it is his.”

Tooru decided that he wanted to be mean.

“Are you really all that surprised?”

Michiko, it seemed, had been expecting it.

“Flabbergasted. Oh, Tooru—”

“Oikawa.”

“—you should’ve _heard_ the way he screamed my name.”

“I bet it was lovely. If you’d like, why don’t you come over to my bedroom tonight and hear how he screams mine?”

She tapped her cigarette against the edge of the ashtray, smirked as if amused, and took another drag.

“You’re proud of yourself,” she said. Not a question. “Quite an accomplishment to be proud of.”

He pursed his lips. The waiter arrived with their coffees, and Michiko waved him away before he could even ask whether they wanted creamer or sugar.

“I hadn’t initially planned on telling you just what you and Hajime did to me, but I’ve changed my mind.”

The reflection that stared up at Tooru from the cup of coffee was absolutely disgusted.

“You know I’ve never loved anybody? Because nobody ever loved me. Men like to throw women around, stomp on them, then toss them to the curb. And you know, I told myself it wouldn’t happen to me. When Hajime showed up in my life it was the first time I had ever really been certain about anything. Love was something I told myself was a fantasy, and then he showed up and fantasy became reality. I’m sure you can imagine.”

She paused to take a sip of coffee and another drag. It was only then that Tooru noticed the bags under her eyes, bags that not even the most expertly applied makeup could hide from him.

“I was ready to spend my _life_ with him. It wasn’t just love, it was commitment, it was confidence in each other. And then you showed up in his life again and he decided that he’d somehow tricked himself into loving me, but couldn’t possibly, because he was riddled with thoughts of wanting to fuck the shit out of you.”

The words coming out of her mouth were angry and bitter, but sounded smooth and sweet. It made Tooru uncomfortable, especially when he looked into her eyes and saw absolutely nothing.

“As much as I hate you, Tooru Oikawa, I wouldn’t even wish upon _you_ the torture I’ve had to endure. Being thrown away like a piece of trash. Nobody deserves that humiliation.”

“If you’re expecting me to apologize, don’t hold your breath.”

“I don’t need your empty apology. It won’t help, and I know you don’t mean it. Besides, what did you do? What role did you even play? You’re a fool, just like me.”

“Excuse me?”

“Like I said, it’s not your fault. It’s his.” She was unapologetically and shamelessly hateful toward Hajime, and Tooru wasn’t surprised. She was hateful toward him, too, but in a different way. He hadn’t really hurt her directly.

“If you didn’t ask me here to yell at me, then why did you ask me here?”

“To warn you.”

“I know what I’m getting into. I’ve known Hajime way longer than you have, and I know him better.”

“Please, do you think I’d really take time out of my day to warn you about Hajime breaking your heart? On the contrary, nothing would give me more pleasure.” Her cigarette was only half-smoked, but she put it out anyway. “I called you to warn you that you’re going to destroy him.”

Tooru was completely taken aback. He crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes, stared at her intensely as he tried to drink in the meaning of her words with the bitterness of the coffee.

“Who the hell are you to talk to me about something like that?”

“I know him better than you think I do. You’re going to destroy him. Slowly, like drinking small amounts of poison over a long period of time.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Of course you don’t. You’re selfish and you have tunnel-vision.”

Before he could even attempt a retort, she continued.

“That’s why I’m telling you. You’re bad for Hajime. I don’t care if he’s bad for you—I’m sure he is. But whatever’s happened, I still love him, and I can’t sit around silently while you let him self-destruct.”

Tooru was completely confused. Angry, blinded with red rage, trying desperately to understand what Michiko was saying.

“Even when we were together, I saw the way you consumed him. I don’t know how you’ve done it—if I did, perhaps I would’ve done it myself. As much as he tried to get over you, when you showed up again, he realized that he never really had. That you were hovering over every aspect of his life, that he could never escape you. You’re like a chain around his ankle that he can’t shake off. And if he can’t shake it off, he’ll never be happy.”

“What?”

“You still don’t understand what I’m saying to you?”

She put her arms on the table and leaned forward, until Tooru could see her lips with excruciating clarity.

“If you and Hajime are together, he’ll _never_ be happy. He’ll be stuck in the past, stuck in some fantasy, forcing himself to love some past you that doesn’t exist anymore. He’ll drive himself crazy to love you. You’ll destroy him, just like you destroyed Ushijima. Because it’s who you are. You destroy things. And it’s who Hajime is. He lets himself be destroyed. Maybe not as badly as Ushijima, but destroyed nonetheless.”

The air left Tooru’s chest in an astoundingly painful rush.

She stood up, grabbing her bag and her coat.

“So if you really love him, you’ll leave him and let him live life for himself. Not for anyone else.”

“Is that what you did? When you suffocated him?” he hissed. Michiko raised her eyebrows, unaffected by his outburst.

“Me? Suffocate him? You can’t be serious.” She put on her coat elegantly. “Hajime and I were truly good for each other, in a way that you never can be. We pushed each other up, supported each other, but we were never obsessed with each other. Never dependent on each other, consumed with each other, ravaged by the mere thought of each other. You can look up those big words in a dictionary if you need to, darling. Be a doll and pick up the check, will you?”

Then she was gone.


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**

Tooru, at eleven years old, had fallen unconscious again during piano practice, after almost 24 hours straight, but his parents decided not to take him to a hospital. They kept him at home, in bed, made him drink a lot of water and practically force-fed him, even though he was uncomfortable and his throat was dry and swallowing brought tears to his eyes. Loneliness joined him in that bed, where he stared at the ceiling and wished that he were playing piano because at least then he would be doing something, anything, to relieve the itch perpetually sitting on his fingertips. Over and over he counted the scratches in the ceiling, wiping away his tears with the back of his hands. When would he learn that it never really helped? Sitting at the piano for hours and hours until his fingers hurt and his eyes became blurry and he couldn’t sit straight anymore? It never helped. The music never quite sounded the way that he wanted it to.

At around noon, while he sniffled, the door to his bedroom opened. He was about to tell his mother to leave, tell her he wanted to be alone, but it wasn’t his mother at the door. It was Hajime, little fingers cautious on the doorknob.

“Iwa-chan!” Tooru called, sitting up.

“Your mom told me I could come up,” he said. He closed the door behind him and nervously rocked back and forth on his heels. “I got worried when you weren’t at school.”

“Oh.”

“At least it’s not the hospital this time,” he said.

“Yeah. I guess so.”

There was silence for a little bit, and Tooru felt the burst of energy subside, so he collapsed back onto the bed and continued staring at the ceiling. It was a little bit better now that Hajime was in the room.

“You shouldn’t keep doing this, you know,” Hajime said.

“I know.”

“You make everyone worry.”

Tooru grinned.

“Even you?”

“Obviously! Otherwise I wouldn’t be here.”

“Hey, Iwa-chan. Come onto the bed with me.”

“Gross.”

“I don’t have a cold or anything, silly, just dehydration.”

Another moment of silence, and Tooru could just imagine Hajime’s little grumpy pout. But then the bed moved, and in the next moment, Hajime was laying on his back right beside Tooru. Now they stared at the ceiling together. The air was warmer and sweeter, and suddenly Tooru’s throat didn’t feel quite so dry.

“Thanks for coming,” he said.

“I was just bored.”

“You’re a terrible liar.”

He glanced over and, sure enough, Hajime’s lower lip was jutted out overdramatically and his hands were folded anxiously on his belly.

“What were you playing? When you passed out?”

“Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven.”

“How is it that I’ve been friends with you for so long, and still don’t understand a word you say?”

“Come on, you’ve definitely heard of Beethoven.”

Hajime shrugged, his mouth now cupped into a small smile.

“Maybe I should just stay with you all the time and make sure you take breaks. You’re so stupid, that seems like the only way to get you to take care of yourself.”

“Hey!”

“I’m serious.”

And he was. He turned to face Tooru and his eyes were hard, his voice low, the muscles in his jaw knotted and tense. Tooru was starting to notice really little things about him. Like the wrinkles on the corners of his mouth when he was angry, the pouts, the way he almost never blinked when he was being serious, the veins in his throat and his temple and the wild directions of his hair.

“What if one day you take it too far? What am I supposed to do then?”

The question took Tooru off-guard, so he laughed. He hadn’t meant to, but when he’d opened his mouth a laugh had escaped before anything else.

“Don’t laugh! I’m serious. I know I’m mean to you all the time, and sometimes I hit you, but you’re my best friend.”

Tooru reached over and grabbed one of his hands, though his grip was weak.

“You’re worrying too much. I’ll be fine, okay?”

“You say that, but how do you know?”

“Because I know.”

“You don’t know everything.”

The tears in Hajime’s eyes stunned Tooru into silence. Hajime’s grip on Tooru’s hand tightened and he turned on his side, buried his face against the pillow.

“You’re the only real friend I’ve ever had and if something happened to you I’d be all alone.”

“Don’t say that,” Tooru said nervously. “You have plenty of friends.”

Hajime shook his head. Lying on the bed seemed to have made him sleepy. His eyelids drooped slowly, as if there were strings pulling down on his eyelashes. His hair shimmered, crushed as it was against the pillow now concave to fit his head. His words slurred as if he were drunk—Tooru had seen his father slur his words like that before, when empty bottles lined the counter.

“We spend too much time together,” Hajime said. Amused, like it was the punch line to a joke or something.

“You’re wrong. It’s normal for best friends to spend this much time together.”

“I don’t think we’re normal, though.” Hajime lifted up Tooru’s fingers and stared at them. Tears started streaming down both their cheeks.

“We’re normal,” Tooru repeated.

“If you were thirsty, I’d cut myself so you could drink my blood.”

His voice was changing, his face morphing, distorting. Tooru’s stomach twisted and he felt the air leave his lungs in a painful rush.

“I would kill someone if you told me to, without even asking why.”

“Stop. Please.”

“If you told me you were cold, I’d strip and give you all my clothes. And if you were still cold, I’d set myself on fire.”

_Please._

“If you were drowning, I’d let you drown me instead, so you could live.”

Hajime was disappearing, fading into nothingness, and Tooru screamed and reached out for him.

“I don’t think that’s normal.”

 

* * *

 

_Sing us a song you’re the piano man._

_Sing us a song tonight._

_Well we’re all in the mood for a melody._

_And you’ve got us feeling all right._

 

* * *

 

Tooru jolted up in Hajime’s bed, heart racing, his entire body covered in sweat. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see (but didn’t want to, so he didn’t bother groping for his glasses), couldn’t sort out the jumbled, nightmarish thoughts in his head. He gripped his chest in a half-hearted, futile attempt to calm his heart, and somehow he couldn’t catch his breath. When he tried to swallow in the air, it pushed back from his throat, leaving him gasping, wheezing. He must have screamed, because Hajime stirred in bed, groaned, and, once he realized that Tooru was shaken and in tears beside him, sat up. Arms, warm and steady, wrapped around him, but still he couldn’t breathe, was choking on his own sobs.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Hajime murmured in his ear. Forced him down against his chest and rocked him back and forth. “It was a nightmare. Just a dream. Not real. You’re okay.”

Tooru focused on Hajime’s breathing on top of his head, on his lips against his cold, shaking skin, and it helped him find his ability to breathe again. Chest aching, body quivering, he fell against Hajime and closed his eyes. Fingers gripped him like claws.

“I’m right here. Take a deep breath.”

Tooru took a deep breath. Hajime’s fingers were brushing through his hair now, matted and twisted with sweat.

“Come on. Lie down.”

“Don’t let go.”

They lay back down on the bed, wrapped in each other, because Tooru would feel lost and empty and frightened otherwise. As they lay there, quiet but for Tooru’s deep, desperate breaths, Hajime began wiping his tears. Kissing his forehead, his eyelashes, the tip of his nose.

“Just a nightmare,” Hajime repeated. Tooru nodded, again and again and again, in some stupid attempt to convince himself. He had managed to calm down and was awfully sleepy.

“If I hurt you,” he heard himself say, “would you leave me?”

“You’re delirious. Why—?”

“I’m perfectly lucid. Answer the question.”

No answer. Wonderful, terrible silence. And then, five clear words.

“You could never hurt me.”

“You’re kidding yourself,” Tooru scoffed. Still reeling.

“What the hell are you talking about? What happened? Talk to me.”

“Nothing, you’re right,” he sighed. “Just a nightmare.”

“Go back to sleep. You’re exhausted.”

“Yeah.”

Sleep was really scary to Tooru at that moment, so he stayed awake, always right on the edge of slumber, while Hajime fell asleep and Tooru fell more and more in love than he ever imagined he could be. That love was also the worst thing he had ever felt.

 

* * *

 

Tooru had grown bored and irritated with going out and was tired, so he invited Issei and Takahiro over for drinks and a night in with him and Hajime. It was around eleven, relatively early, but they were all already drunk. Issei was passed out, facedown on the couch, and Takahiro was finishing another beer and saying bad, slurred jokes. He wouldn’t stop walking around the room in circles. Tooru and Hajime were on the other couch, Tooru’s legs in Hajime’s lap and his arm around his neck. He was whispering languidly in his ear and letting his tongue run its course. Hajime was quiet, passive, face flushed, and Takahiro didn’t seem to notice.

“Knock knock,” Takahiro called.

“Who’s there, Makki?” Tooru replied loudly.

“A broken pencil.”

“...A broken pencil who?”

“Never mind, it’s pointless.”

They broke into disgusting laughter, and Hajime, the most sober of them all, rolled his eyes. Like a puppet with cut strings, Tooru fell over him, draped his limbs over Hajime’s, let his face burrow into the warm crook of his neck. A little pillow for his head when he was tired—a fireplace where he could sit and warm his cold, aching-from-the-shivers body. Hajime’s cold lips touched his forehead.

“I want another drink,” he murmured. His lips were close, and they could taste the salt of Hajime’s skin, and for that moment drunk stand-up comedian Takahiro disappeared.

“I think you’ve had enough,” Hajime replied.

“You’re not the boss of me.”

Supporting himself on Hajime’s shoulders, Tooru straightened up just enough, just until his open lips were hovering over Hajime’s open lips. He was drunk and was in a taunting, jeering mood—he wanted to make Hajime desperate for him, wanted to make him dizzy with desire, wanted to drive him mad with the way his lips moved and the way he pressed his fingers into the back of his shoulder. Wanted Hajime seeing stars in his eyes, hearing satin and Rachmaninoff in his voice, feeling rose petals, piano keys, the barrel of a freshly cleaned gun on his skin. Wanted Hajime to feel his tongue dry because it wasn’t licking every inch of him, nose stuffy and itchy because it wasn’t breathing him in, lips chapped because they weren’t kissing his. There was nothing Tooru wanted more in that moment than to make Hajime mad, lustful like an animal, so he teased him.

“No?”

Tooru watched Hajime’s eyelashes collapse as his gaze moved down to Tooru’s lips. Red and glistening, close but not quite close enough. He licked those red, glistening lips slowly, tracing his upper lip back and forth, back and forth. Tilted his head ever so slightly, and when Hajime squeezed Tooru’s thighs more tightly, Tooru couldn’t help the coy smirk that curled up his open, red, glistening lips.

“Absolutely not,” he replied. Hajime leaned forward to swallow the red, glistening rose petal lips, but Tooru tilted his head further back. To tease him just a little more. Because it was fun and made him the most powerful person in the world. He wouldn’t let himself be kissed yet. Too easy.

“Get a room,” Takahiro, the only one to acknowledge his own presence, called. Then, like a response to Takahiro’s joke, the doorbell rang, the little shrill tone reverberating through the house.

“Makki, would you get that for me and tell whoever’s there to leave?” Tooru said, his eyes never leaving Hajime’s entranced face. “I’m a little busy at the moment.” Hajime reached forward, so he tilted back further.

“I’m a little busy at the moment,” Takahiro parroted in a mocking tone. Still, after he said that, Tooru could hear Takahiro’s footsteps as he went to answer the door. As the footsteps disappeared, Tooru brought his hand to the back of Hajime’s head and entangled his fingers there in Hajime’s dark, raven hair. It was wild, it was a patch of tall, tender grass on a rainy day against Tooru’s palm.

Only when he heard Hajime whisper, with a desperation bordering madness, “You’re never fair, you’re never fair, you’re never fair,” did he finally kiss him. His upper lip first, trapped, swallowed, then his bottom lip. Trapped. Swallowed. Tooru fell into his languor as Hajime fell into his lust—he began to kiss him slow and hard, his thick, wet, Americano-bitter honey-sweet tongue probing the far and near corners of his open mouth.

you’re never fair, you’re never fair, you’re never fair

They were slow, they were sloppy, they were blind, deaf, dumb, they could feel absolutely nothing. They could feel absolutely everything.

Tooru fell slowly onto his back, pulled Hajime down with him, relished the loss of breath that arrested him when Hajime’s chest pushed him down into the cushions. Slow and sloppy. Slow and sloppy Hajime kissed him, stopping every few moments to suck on Tooru’s lips, or bite down on them, or _breathe_. Tooru let one of his legs hang off over the side of the couch, let his toes touch the floor, but he couldn’t tell where his hands were. They could have been anywhere. What mattered, what really mattered in that moment, was the dance of Hajime’s tongue. It was to a melody that Tooru had never heard before, a melody that swallowed him whole.

Hajime kissed the corner of Tooru’s mouth and, when Tooru arched his neck back—beckoned—he lowered his lips to that land. His jaw, his chin, then just below. To his neck, where he started to draw the notes of that melody in thick wet letters. An awareness, vague at best, of approaching footsteps reached Tooru’s ear. Vague, because his mind was swirling, drowning in a wine-induced, tongue-enhanced stupor. Hajime’s tongue took control and as it twisted and turned against his neck, Tooru smiled and the most beautiful, involuntary sigh left his red, glistening lips.

His eyes opened for a fleeting moment while his neck was arched, and he saw two people in the entryway of the living room. Where Issei was asleep on the couch, and Tooru and Hajime were hoarse and covered in lust the way flowers in spring were covered in pollen. The first was Takahiro, anxious.

The woman beside him was in her mid-40s, and the expression on her face was both stern and kind. A woman who loved very much, but who was not afraid to discipline. Not a single hair was out of place. It was black and sleek, pulled back into a low ponytail. Though she was short, she stood in a way that made her tall; she wore a silk white blouse, beneath a red tweed blazer and a matching red skirt. Not too fitted, not too loose, accentuating the good parts of her figure and hiding the not so good. Her face looked tired, pale, with impeccable eyeliner and lipstick red, but not like blood. More like the red of twilight. She wore simple pantyhose and through them, her toenails were painted gold. Which didn’t quite match the rest of the outfit, but it wasn’t easy to notice.

As Tooru’s gaze fell upon the woman, he felt the world turn on its head.

Harshly and ungraciously, he pushed Hajime off him, nearly throwing him to the ground, and scrambled to his feet. He couldn’t catch his breath—it was still sitting on Hajime’s tongue, sneering at him from behind.

“Mama,” he said, voice slurred and low as he tried to gulp in air. She smiled, and that made him unbelievably furious. “What are you doing here?”

“You haven’t been answering your phone,” she replied calmly.

“Did you ever think it’s because I don’t want to talk to you—or _see_ you?”

“Tooru, please,” she sighed. Her gaze flickering from nervous Takahiro to disoriented Hajime. “Why don’t we go to kitchen?”

She reached her hand out. Tooru stared at it for a moment, unsure if it were reaching out in reality or if the alcohol had finally made him delusional, but he took it anyway. Tooru’s mother led him to the kitchen, away from Issei, away from Takahiro, away from Hajime. Surely she’d noticed that he was drunk. Surely.

When they were alone, she gave another sad sigh and clasped her hands together in front of her. Tooru noticed that the wrinkles on the corners of her eyes had become worse since he’d last seen her.

“Tooru, my love—”

“Don’t give me that! I don’t wanna hear it.” He waved his hand erratically and leaned back against the refrigerator. Closed his eyes tight, tight, wishing that she would just disappear.

“I need you to talk to me. We both need you,” she continued.

“Both? You don’t mean dearest Papa,” Tooru laughed. His mother flinched as if he’d slapped her. “Don’t make me laugh, Mama. He very obviously couldn’t care _less_ about me.”

“That’s not true. You know it.”

“Do I? I don’t think I do!” He laughed like a madman. “Someone who cared about me wouldn’t lie to me the way he did. Stealing away my best friend, the love of my life, for six years.”

“Your father cares about you, he does.”

“Funny way of showing it.”

“Tooru—”

“Unfortunately for him, we found each other. Guess I might end up happy after all.”

“You’re drunk.”

“Of course I’m drunk.”

“Please stop acting like a child.”

“A child? Me? Acting like a child? Come _on_ , Mama!” He laughed again and threw his arms out. “Who’s really the child? Me, or the stupid old man who went behind my back to ruin one of the only good things in my life?”

His mother furrowed her brow and took a step forward.

“Watch your tone when you talk about your father.”

“If you don’t like my tone, leave. I’ll talk about him however I fucking want.”

“Tooru!”

“Why did you even come? Because unless you’re here to explain, really explain, I want you to go.”

“I’m...not here to explain.”

“Then—”

“But your father might be willing to.”

Tooru paused and had to give the words a few moments to sink in.

“But I thought...”

His mother took another deep breath and suddenly looked very, very old.

“He’s dying, Tooru. And he says he wants to see you.” 


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**

The most ironic part of the whole thing was that they used Wakatoshi Ushijima’s car to get to Kyoto, where Tooru’s parents lived. Hajime had asked him to borrow it for his day off without giving a reason and Wakatoshi, who without hesitation would trust Hajime with his life, allowed him to without asking for one. Tooru had laughed dryly when he’d imagined what Wakatoshi’s reaction would have been. Giving Hajime his car so that he could drive Tooru to his parents’ house, a car that they had driven in together, kissed in, fucked in. He hadn’t laughed because it was funny. He had just laughed at the sheer irony of it all, and he’d laughed in hatred of himself.

Tooru felt both comfortable and terribly uneasy sitting in the passenger seat of Wakatoshi’s car while Hajime drove. The car was familiar, at the very least there was that. Tooru’s body fit perfectly into the car seat, molded and scooped out specifically for him after all the times he’d sat there. Petty, rude, absolutely horrible to his earnest, tactless driver. After his conversation with Michiko, he’d started have strange recurring nightmares. Like the one where Hajime comes to see him, and then disappears, telling Tooru that he’ll spill his own blood for him. He also had nightmares about Wakatoshi, prostrating himself, kissing Tooru’s feet while Tooru kicked him down into an abyss of unrequited love and unapologetic exploitation. Usually there were monsters down in that abyss, and Tooru was forced to watch as they devoured Wakatoshi. Tore him limb from limb, ripped the skin from his body until he was unrecognizable.

The only reasonable conclusion Tooru had been able to come to was that he missed Wakatoshi. More than a lover, he’d been a really good friend. Tooru had to keep reminding himself that surely, surely he didn’t miss Wakatoshi because of _Wakatoshi_ ; he missed Wakatoshi because he had given Tooru something comfortable, easy, given him something he could latch onto, and now that was gone. It had been gone for months. So it was strange that Tooru was still tossing and turning at night, seeing Wakatoshi’s broken face as he held out a ring that Tooru would never wear.

Now, in his car for almost six hours, he could smell Wakatoshi, could feel him so strongly that he might as well have been in the car with them. Sitting between them, maybe trying to pry their fingers apart. Tooru wanted to see Wakatoshi. Whether it was from guilt, selfishness, a genuine desire to see him again, he wasn’t actually sure. But he was thinking of Wakatoshi and he wanted to see him and apologize again. He wanted to say that he wanted to stay friends—because, Ushiwaka, you’re such a good, good friend. But he figured Wakatoshi wouldn’t want to hear that. Because he’d already admitted that he would love Tooru for the rest of his life, and you couldn’t really be friends with someone you love so passionately. Tooru had already tried.

“Your hand is sweating,” Hajime observed. One hand on the steering wheel, while the other absentmindedly held Tooru’s hand.

“It’s hot.”

Hajime threw a cursory glance to the passenger seat, but only for a moment before directing his gaze back to the road.

“How are you feeling?”

“I’m...fine. I feel a fever coming on.”

He was exceptionally tired—one of those days where the same beast that distorted his fingers and took piano away from him made him so absurdly fatigued.

“We’ll try not to stay long. Just take it easy.”

Tooru nodded, but now that he was reading the signs on the road that directed them to Kyoto, he started to feel queasy. He was thinking of how amazing it felt that Hajime was coming with them—in fact, he had absolutely refused to let Tooru come by himself, and having that support from the one person he wanted it from was a feeling of ecstasy that rivaled the most intense orgasm. But he was also thinking of the way Wakatoshi never talked to him anymore. And, the worst of all, he was thinking about his father. He’d been able to feel nothing but blinding, painful red rage toward his father since the day he saw Hajime, and cold disappointment with his mother. An explanation, he admitted to himself, would help him. Encourage him to move on and forgive, maybe. But, knowing himself, Tooru was not going to forgive anybody.

He didn’t want to see his father, especially now that he was on his deathbed.

Wasn’t he the same man who noticed Tooru’s musical talents when he was just three? The man who had worked overtime to pay for Tooru’s piano lessons and travel expenses? The man who had taken out a loan, just to buy a car and drive Tooru from city to city to play music? The same man who always used to sit in the front row at Tooru’s concerts, clapping, nodding, insisting because, “When you get nervous, you’ll have a friendly face to look to.” What had happened to the man that Tooru had idolized, had cried over when he couldn’t come to New York? The man who’d nursed him back to health (despite, in retrospect, encouraging his illness in the first place), the man who’d encouraged him to pursue his dreams, the man who had loved him unconditionally for every moment of his 25 years of life?

Still, Tooru felt rage. There was nothing, he told himself, that could convince him to forgive his father for what he’d done.

“I’ll be right outside the whole time,” Hajime said, undoubtedly noticing the concerned expression on Tooru’s face. As he chewed gum, stared out of the window, chewed on his lower lip. Unresponsive to the flirty movements of Hajime’s fingers.

“I just don’t want to see him.”

“Come on, Tooru. He’s your father. And he’s dying.”

“Why are you defending him?”

“I’m not. Just try to keep an open mind. Listen to what he has to say.”

“And if I don’t like it?”

“Then you can wrestle with your hatred for him for the rest of your stupid little life.”

“Bite me.”

Hajime let go of Tooru’s fingers for a moment so that he could stroke his cheek. Comfortingly, affectionately. Tooru let that touch take him to a better place, where he and Hajime were together and there was nothing else. There didn’t have to be anything else.

“I’ll be right outside,” he repeated. “I’ll take you to a nice restaurant when we’re done.”

“My hero with the big bucks, hmm?”

“And the big guns.”

“Why else would I be with you?”

His mother answered the door almost immediately after he’d knocked. Hajime had suggested he stay in the car, but Tooru had insisted that he come inside. His mother had always liked Hajime—she’d appreciated that at least Tooru had had one friend other than the piano. She would take care of him.

“Hi, baby,” she greeted, holding her arms out. Tooru leaned down and let her plant a kiss on his forehead. Then she turned to Hajime. “Iwaizumi-kun, it’s so nice to see you.”

“And you. It’s been a while.”

“It certainly has. Please, come inside.”

The house was large—of course it was. Tooru was paying for it. Well furnished, clean, white and traditional because his father had always been very traditional. He didn’t hear classical music when he was here. Instead, he heard nagauta, and the twists and turns and nuances of the shamisen.

Shojis separated one room from the other, elaborate ranma lined the walls, the floors were completely made of tatami and littered with zabuton; to get to the living room, they had to walk along the engawa. It reminded Tooru of his childhood home, and it made him sick to his stomach. His own home (and Hajime’s apartment) was so westernized that he’d nearly forgotten what it was like to live in a home like this. His mother was wearing a pink, floral jinbei and her back was very straight as she walked. Tooru watched her back and realized that he had missed her, too. The way she never let her hips sway when she walked, how she never moved without being very deliberate, what she’d taught him about the importance of appearance. “The first impression is always the most important.”

There were a lot of things for which he was grateful to his parents. That much, he could admit to himself.

In the reception room, she already had a tray of tea ready, so Hajime sat down at the chabudai while she poured him some.

“Tooru, my love, won’t you—”

“Can I see him?” His impatience was more powerful than his maturity today. His mother stared at him for a few moments, and he saw pity in her eyes. He also saw her pleading. Silently pleading with him for forgiveness, because she loved her husband almost as much as she loved her son.

“Yes. You can see him. Iwaizumi-kun, will you please excuse us?”

“Of course.”

Touching his elbow, his mother led Tooru out of the room. Down the engawa, to the room where his father was bedridden. Tooru hadn’t bothered asking what illness had come over him. He didn’t want to know. He didn’t need to know. She slid the shoji and walked into the room, Tooru at her heels. He shut the shoji behind him.

His father might as well have been dead already; Tooru could hardly recognize him. He was emaciated, as if he had never eaten a mouthful of food in his entire life, and his breathing ragged and short. At only 50, he looked as if he could have been 100 years old. Eyes gaunt, sunken, face pale, beard scraggly. His eyes were pinned vacantly, like balls of murky glass, to the ceiling. When he heard the shoji and the light footsteps of his wife and son, he moved those glass balls to the doorway. Lifted his hand ever so slightly. Tooru’s mother leaped forward to grab it, hold it, kiss it.

“Tooru’s come back,” she said softly. “Your little boy is here.”

“Tooru,” his father echoed. He looked at Tooru, as if only then realizing that he was there. His wife put his hand back down onto the bed and stepped to the doorway.

“I’ll leave you two alone for a bit. Call me if you need anything, my loves.”

She left, and Tooru considered grabbing her arm to stop her. He didn’t want to be alone in this hell, forced to watch a demon he had once loved so much wither away, engulfing the entire room in flames. But he wasn’t brave enough, and she left, and he was alone.

“Hello, Papa.”

When Tooru said that word. That “Papa” that he had said so many times in his life, he saw the withered creature in the bed smile. He lifted his hand to beckon, and, under a strange spell, Tooru followed. He knelt by the bed and held his father’s shriveled hand. It felt cold and its coldness did not touch his heart.

“My son. My little baby boy. How was your lesson today? I’m sure you did so well,” he said. Tooru blinked in astonished silence. His mother hadn’t told him about this.

“M...my lesson?”

“Your piano lesson. Are you working yourself too hard again? You know what the doctors said about that.”

“M-my lesson was fine, Papa.”

“Good, good. What are you learning?”

“Your favorite.”

“Ah, that Beethoven. Genius. If only he’d been Japanese.”

“German is fine, too.”

His father laughed. His music had always been strange: a combination of Beethoven and kabuki dance.

“Your hand is sweating, Tooru.”

“It’s hot.”

“Is it?”

It was evident that his father wouldn’t be able to answer any of Tooru’s questions. To him, Tooru was still a child. A little boy practicing to be a concert pianist, who worked himself too hard and liked to play Beethoven for his wistful father. For a moment, Tooru wanted to be that child.

“You feeling okay, Papa?”

“Me? Oh, yes. Just a bit tired. You know.”

“Mhmm.”

“And school? How was school today? What did you learn?”

“All kinds of things.”

“My sweet, smart boy.”

He lifted that skeletal hand and touched Tooru’s cheek. Stayed there.

“My sweet, smart, handsome boy.”

“Papa, can I ask you something?”

“Of course you can.”

“What do you think of Hajime?”

“Hajime...oh, the little Iwaizumi boy.”

“That’s right.”

“He’s kind to you. So I like him.”

“You do? Really?”

“Of course I do. What a strange question to ask.” As he laughed, he fell into a fit of coughing. Tooru grabbed a nearby glass of water and helped him swallow. Suddenly everything around him was shattering and he felt the sympathy that he’d assumed himself incapable of feeling.

“I always thought you kind of...didn’t want me hanging around him.”

“Preposterous. Why would I not want you hanging around with him? He’s such a good friend to you.”

“Yeah, he is...”

“But you know, Tooru.” His father closed his eyes for a moment, cleared his throat, the way he always did before he gave a lecture. Tooru prepared himself and blinked away the strange tears that had gathered. “You better be careful around him. He seems attached to you.”

“Well, I’m attached to him, too. Why should I be careful?”

“Because, you know...people these days.”

“People these days?”

“In their unnatural ways. You never know who’s around the corner, waiting.”

“Papa, what on earth are you talking about?”

“Men with other men—it’s not right. I don’t want to assume anything about the little Iwaizumi boy, he seems nice, his parents are very good people, but you never know. The world is changing, Tooru, you have to be careful.”

The world stopped and everything became stunningly, earth-shatteringly clear. Tooru saw everything and felt everything and hated absolutely everything. He’d never felt such an intense anger, and it made him want to rip his own heart out because it was such a terrible feeling. It was a burning that consumed his entire body and made it impossible to feel any white hint of pleasure, happiness, any semblance of bliss. The words cut through the façade, the charade, the game that he was playing and brought everything back into a stark reality where everything he’d ever loved had been stripped away from him. (Though, in some ways, that only seemed fair. He’d experienced more success in a decade than most would experience in a lifetime.) Whatever fucked up reality had invaded his father’s brain, it didn’t really matter, because Tooru understood now and as it turned out, he’d been right along. There really was nothing his father could have said.

“Papa.”

“What is it, sweet Tooru? Why are you looking at me like that? Come now, don’t look at your father like that. I never said I don’t want you hanging around him. I think you two should stay close friends, absolutely, I like the boy; he’s very polite.”

“You’re rotten to the core, Papa. You’re rotten to your very core.”

He dropped his father’s hand and stood up. A renewed energy leapt into the glass balls of his father’s eyes and he sat up straighter, urgent, though his limbs shook and his lips trembled so much that he could hardly speak.

“T-Tooru, what are you—?”

“I hate you, and I never want to see you again.”

He watched as tears welled in his father’s eyes, and he reached out desperately for his son’s hand. Reaching with fingers that were red, aching, fragile, like tubes of glass. He was all glass, all of him, and Tooru wanted to break him.    

“No, no, what are you saying? Tell me, what did Papa do wrong? Don’t say you hate me, don’t break my heart.”

“I’ll say it over and over until you shatter,” Tooru hissed. “I hate you.”

He began walking to the door, deaf to the hoarse calls of his father behind him. He could practically feel his father’s arm, stretched out, even if just to graze the back of Tooru’s shirt and keeping him in the room for a single moment longer.

“Don’t leave me! My son, my beautiful son, _talk to me_. Tell your Papa what’s making you say these things.”

“I hope you suffer,” Tooru murmured, turning over his shoulder. “I hope you think about how much I hate you and I hope you suffer.”

He could hear his father crying. It was the first and only time he’d ever seen his father shed a tear. And his crying was disgusting, unrelenting sobbing.

“Tooru, don’t leave me here alone! I love you, my son, please...”

“I hope you rot in hell.”

He slid the shoji open and slammed it closed again, and through the thin panel he could hear his father wailing. He kept his ears open and let the sobs flow into him as he walked back to the guest room, forced Hajime to his feet, and walked to the doorway. His mother scurried after him and tried to ask him what had happened, but he wouldn’t talk to her. He wouldn’t even look at her. He dragged Hajime out to the car and he slammed the door when he got in and when they were safely inside, doors closed and locked, alone in the driveway, Tooru banged his fists on the dashboard and screamed. 


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25**

Tooru was losing his mind, and the only thing keeping him grounded was Hajime.

His father had betrayed him for reasons that Tooru would never be able to understand, and the betrayal cut so deep that when he thought about it for more than five minutes at a time his lungs shriveled and he lost the ability to breathe. And then his fingers had betrayed him, burning bright red and cracking, shifting out of place, bending backward and forward in ways they’d never been meant to move. They’d started to ache and the piano that they had swallowed they spit back out in anger. They had been the only things connecting him to any sliver of happiness and then they had decided that they didn’t love him anymore, and they had stopped giving him the happiness he needed.

And then Hajime had appeared to kiss his jagged fingertips and hum to him at night. It was true, Hajime couldn’t understand Tooru when he talked about music, and sometimes he got too exasperated to listen, but that didn’t matter. The bad things about Hajime—his temper, his stubbornness, his susceptibility to negative emotions, the fact that he didn’t really feel anything when he listened to Rachmaninoff or Beethoven or Chopin—were made almost invisible by the good things—his kind heart, his calloused palms smoothing out Tooru’s back, his aggressive supportiveness and angry caretaking.

Which was why, as Tooru’s mind fell apart, Hajime kept it at least taped together.

About two hours after they’d left Kyoto, the fever and fatigue hit Tooru with such force that he thought he was dying. He dropped his head down onto the dashboard and hugged himself meekly, as his body began to quiver. The world began to spin and dance in white, flashes, bursts of color that hurt his head, terrible flames lighting up the pale skin of his slender, weak fingers. As soon as Hajime noticed, he pulled over to the side of the road and started to get out of the car.

“I-I’m fine,” Tooru tried to insist.

“Bullshit. Just don’t move.”

As other cars drove by, making their parked one shake, Hajime got out, carefully, and walked around to Tooru’s side. Opened the door. Tooru could hardly see anything, there were so many fireworks in his eyes, and a ringing in his ears. Hajime’s hand touched his back, his arm, and then his voice was right there rising above every last fucking firework.

“Try to take a deep breath. Come on.”

Tooru tried, but his breath rattled and he could hardly keep himself upright. Luckily, he didn’t have to—Hajime’s arms were right there to steady him. His arms had been nice and muscular like that since they were...fifteen, it must have been. The first time he’d caught Tooru and steadied him was when they’d been walking along the riverbank and it had been too dark, and Tooru had tripped and nearly fallen into the river, but like an instinct Hajime had reached out to catch him. They’d been the same height then.

“Do you have any medicine?”

Tooru shook his head.

“Shit. Well...you should at least lie down,” Hajime murmured. Tooru tried to nod, but he wasn’t sure if Hajime could tell, his entire body was just nodding with the shivers, and he couldn’t really speak. He moved as well as he could the way that Hajime was leading him. Gently out of the seat, legs first, shaky like the way a foal’s are right after it’s born. But not once—not even for a single moment—did Tooru feel as if he was going to fall.

Slowly, Hajime helped him out of the car and opened the door to the backseat. He went in first, and pulled Tooru softly after him, helping him lie down across the seats, on his back. Body stretched out like that, Tooru felt almost immediately better. The roof of the car still spun when he opened his eyes, and it hurt his head so he kept them closed. He felt Hajime beside him, kneeling on the floor of the car, squeezing himself into that small space because he needed to be there. His palm pressed down against Tooru’s forehead and his lips kissed his cheek.

“Better?”

Tooru nodded. Hajime kissed his cheek again and let his lips sit there, salty against Tooru’s skin, for what seemed like centuries.

“I know it’s not that comfortable, babe. I’ll try to get us home as soon as possible.”

Tooru nodded again. It was the only thing he could do. He did manage, though, to lift his hand up and grope mindlessly in the air. Within moments, Hajime had grabbed his hand and squeezed it. Careful, of course, to be gentle with his swollen fingers.

“Try to get some sleep, all right? I’ll drive as smoothly as I can.”

“H-Hajime,” he croaked. Hajime brought his face closer and leaned his forehead against Tooru’s temple. “Do you love me?”

“What sort of stupid question is that? Of course I love you. You know I do.”

“How much?”

Hajime paused, and a shiver passed over Tooru’s body like a shadow.

“More than I can describe.”

“T-try.”

“Uh, okay. Let me think...okay, so you know the ocean—”

“T-too cliché.”

“Hey, Shittykawa, beggars can’t be choosers.”

Tooru smiled, letting his head fall to his shoulder so that he could be really facing Hajime. The world was still spinning, ears were still ringing, the absurd fluctuations of temperature still ravaging his body.

“Please?”

“Fine. You used to like aliens, so I’ll use space as an example. You know what scientists say about space?”

“Mhmm.”

“That we, like, can’t even fathom how large it is. Infinite, really. Our brains can’t process that. Because to us, everything is easier to think about as finite.”

“Mhmm.”

“That’s what I think my love for you is like.”

If Tooru hadn’t been delirious, he would’ve started crying.

“I love you, too,” he said.

“I know. Now get some rest.”

With one more kiss to Tooru’s forehead, Hajime got out of the car, closed the door, and then slid back into the driver’s seat and pulled onto the highway.

For the next four hours, Tooru was falling in and out of restless sleep. Dreaming about Hajime, about his father, about poor Wakatoshi Ushijima. His mind couldn’t decide on a single piece of music to play so it was as if every song he had ever heard started to mash together and it was an awful, unholy sound that followed him every minute. Sometimes he really did think he was dead, and he must have gone straight to hell for fucking with so many people’s lives.

They made it back in one piece to Hajime’s apartment. Hajime helped him up the stairs, into bed (where Gemini immediately joined him), gave him some medicine, turned off the lights, and let him really sleep until the fever broke on its own.

 

* * *

 

Tooru tried not to think about his father, but it was a nearly impossible task because Hajime was a living reminder of what his father had done and forgotten about. Two weeks after his trip to Kyoto, Tooru decided it was about time to teach Tobio something special. He wanted to teach him the Suite Bergamasque—the same one that he had taught himself when he was ten, the first time he’d been sent to the hospital. As Tooru expected. _Clair de lune_ was Tobio’s favorite. He played with softness in his fingers, a softness that Tooru had to coax out of him. It took him a few lessons to master, but Tooru was astonished and proud of the way that Tobio had learned to make these pieces his own. Even after he admitted to going home after lessons and looking up Tooru’s performances on his father’s iPad, sitting and forcing his twin brother to watch and listen with him despite his obvious distaste for this kind of music.  

Tooru decided, that same week, that he wanted to hold a private recital in his home for all his students. Their families would come, they would play their favorite pieces, and then they could eat little fancy cookies and have tea and feel like they were special. At the very least, he wanted his students to believe that they were special, even if the only really special one among them (piano-wise) was Tobio. He had Issei and Takahiro help him bake the cookies and clean the house, opened the door to the piano room so that it was easily connected to the living room and everyone could sit and watch and listen. They even stayed for the recital, too. They played in order of skill, though Tooru obviously didn’t tell them that. Tobio went last. Tooru stood to the side, watching, and when Tobio would look up at him he gave a gentle nod. The same way he did when he watched Tobio compete—the way Tooru’s own father used to do.

When all of the children had finished playing, they and their families went to the dining room for cookies and tea and soda. Tooru stood, like a proper host, speaking with whoever approached him. Parents who wanted to thank him for bringing their children so far, who were asking him just what sorts of skill their child had.

“She’s certainly on the right track toward being a fine pianist,” was his generic answer. Until, of course, Tobio’s father approached. Dressed in a perfectly tailored suit, hair gelled and skin bronze and smooth, brown hair cropped short. He really did look the part of the politician, with his serene but intense expression.

“So nice to finally meet you, Oikawa-san.” He reached out for a handshake, and Tooru shook his hand gladly. Koushi stood beside him, holding Tobio, nibbling on a cookie, by the hand. With his other arm he held a small, sleeping child that Tooru assumed was Tobio’s brother, with fiery orange hair and pale skin. Though they were twins, they really looked nothing alike. The boy had fallen asleep in the middle of the recital and missed his brother’s performance.

“The pleasure is mine. I’m glad you could make it,” Tooru replied. Mr. Sawamura smiled.

“Tobio has come such a long way, and it’s all thanks to you.”

“Absolutely not. Tobio-chan’s done all the work himself.” He threw a smile Tobio’s way, and Tobio sheepishly grinned back.

“That’s so nice to hear. Now we just have to get his brother to find something like that,” Mr. Sawamura laughed.

“I think Tobio can start considering being serious about piano. He certainly has the talent.”

Mr. Sawamura raised his eyebrows.

“You really think so?”

“Of course. I think he has magic in his fingers.”

Tooru reached his hand out, so Tobio took his own little hand from Koushi’s and put it in Tooru’s. He swung it back and forth gently.

“You probably gave me some of your magic, Oikawa-sensei,” he said.

“Hmm, maybe you’re right, Tobio-chan.”

“We’ll certainly think about that. Thank you.” Mr. Sawamura smiled again, then looked to Koushi. “Suga, why don’t you take Shouyou out to the car? It’s time we headed back.”

“Sure, Mr. Sawamura.”

He and Koushi left. But before Tobio could follow them, Tooru tugged lightly on his hand and knelt down to be eye-level with him. He put his hands on little Tobio’s shoulders and looked straight into his eyes.

“Tobio-chan, darling, I’m going to ask you a question. And you need to answer honestly, okay?”

Tobio, taken aback, nodded.

“Do you like piano?”

“Yes,” he replied, without hesitation.

“And do you want to play piano for the rest of your life?”

“Yes, Oikawa-sensei.”

“You want to practice every single day for the rest of your whole life?”

“Yes, Oikawa-sensei.”

“Listen to me, Tobio-chan. I don’t want you to do this just because you think your father wants you to, or because you think I want you to. I want you to do it because _you_ want to.” He smoothed Tobio’s hair, suddenly gripped by affection. Tobio nodded, again and again and again.

“I know, Oikawa-sensei. But I like piano. I like it a lot. And I want to keep taking lessons from you. Unless...you don’t want me anymore. Cuz I make you mad sometimes, I know. I make Suga mad sometimes, too.”

“No, no, my sweet boy.”

Tooru pulled Tobio into a hug, holding his small body tight to his chest.

“I’ll keep giving you lessons as long as you want me to. There’s nothing I would love more,” he murmured. Tobio hugged him back, his fingers squeezing the back of Tooru’s shirt. “I know I yell at you sometimes, but it’s just because I’m mean.”

“You’re not mean, Oikawa-sensei.”

Tooru chuckled, pulled away, held Tobio’s face in his hands.

“Thank you, Tobio-chan. You played beautifully today.” He kissed his forehead. “Now go join your family. I’ll see you at our next lesson.”

“Thank you, Oikawa-sensei.”

Before he turned and scurried off, Tobio bowed swiftly at the waist. He’d always been a little nervous about smiling too much, so Tooru could tell that he was hiding his smile.

 

* * *

 

It was raining outside on the day that Tooru let himself finally break down.

He was spending the day at Hajime’s. In the morning, just before the rain began to fall, he put on a coat and took Gemini out for a walk. They were a good team, they looked really nice together, so he always liked walking her when he could. Gemini had grown attached to him, and he to her, because to him she represented the bridge between the friendship he’d had with Hajime and the reunion, the new, flowering love that they had. (Although the love wasn’t really all that new. Perhaps for either of them.) Back home, Tooru took a shower and then spread out on the couch to watch television, while Gemini curled up against him thinking she was a puppy and not a very large dog. He didn’t mind. The day was slow and mindless. No lessons, no meetings, nothing that he needed to be thinking about. So he was letting himself vegetate on the couch to stupidly funny American sitcoms. His brain needed this break, it needed it desperately.

Hajime called in the middle of the day to tell Tooru that he would be home late. Maybe around ten, so Tooru slid into resignation of loneliness. Which wasn’t really a fair sentiment to beautiful, generous Gemini. He decided that he wanted to have something nice waiting for Hajime when he got home—something other than Tooru, naked, laying on the bed with a beckoning glisten in his eyes. It was something Hajime needed. Lately he’d been waking up in the middle of the night with nightmares about the murders he’d seen, serial killers he’d locked up, mysterious faceless yakuza he was hunting. But his pride wouldn’t let him go talk to a therapist, so it was eating away at him and hurting Tooru to watch. He had to be content with just giving Hajime little things to keep him together. So around eight he went into the kitchen to try and cook dinner with whatever ingredients Hajime had in his refrigerator. He decided to go with fried rice, since it was easy and most of the ingredients were there.

He hadn’t realized that his fingers were in a mood of rebellion. Then he tried to crack the eggs. He held one lightly in his fingers, and as he bent to crack it on the side of the counter, his fingers shook as if an earthquake had erupted beneath them, and the egg fell and splattered across the floor around his feet. For a moment, all he could do was stare, while the sound made Gemini’s head come up in surprise. He found the mess bizarrely disgusting, though he’d seen plenty of broken eggs before. He felt he was looking at something gruesome, something bloody and violent and cruel, and he covered his mouth with the back of his hand to hold back the sudden desire to vomit.

_Take a deep breath, Tooru._

It was strange. He found it so much harder to breathe when someone wasn’t there—Hajime, Wakatoshi, it didn’t really matter—reminding him to. The flare had come unexpectedly, so for a little bit he just stood there in confusion and paralysis. Then he decided to try and clean it up. Gemini had gone back to sleep. He grabbed a towel in both hands, using the heels of his palms, and then crouched down to clean up the mess. But when he tried to hold the towel and scoop up the debris, try to get this disgusting, horrible sight off the floor, turning red and gory before him, his body absolutely refused to aid him. Now his knees, pushing down into the hard tile floor, were hurting, too. Everything began to ache and the world he held in his hands crumpled. He tried to pick up the pieces but they slipped through his grip like grains of sand, dropping down into a dark abyss of nothingness, dragged and crushed by long, twisted red fingers with no fingernails. He, too, dropped down into that nothingness.

 

* * *

 

I see your face, and it’s hard. Not like steel, though. Kinda like ice. Like if I put it next to a fireplace, or lit a match, it would melt. And it’s not a mean ice. It’s a really pretty, crystal ice, so I’m not sure that I really want to melt it.

 

* * *

 

He laughed at what Hajime must have been thinking when he walked into his apartment to find it completely upturned—as if a tornado had come through.

 

* * *

 

A singer had talked about that once. Tornados in rooms and stuff. Frank Ocean, I think. I should listen to him more. There isn’t a lot of piano in his music, maybe that’s why I haven’t really paid attention to him all that much. He has a honey-sweet voice, though.

 

* * *

 

Hajime held him for a little bit, maybe just to stall. He would have to deal with this eventually. Would have to deal with the fact that the love of his life was crumpled up on the floor, overcome with emotions of all extremes. Would have to deal with everything in his refrigerator on the floor, the dog food scattered, plates broken, pots and pans and woks dented and on the floor. He would have to deal with all of that eventually. But for a bit, he just held him like an infant.

 

* * *

 

I’m usually so happy that his arms are so muscular. It’s really sexy, and it’s really comforting. I look at them and I just know, I just _know_ , that when I fall he can catch me as if I were a marble rolling off a table. But at this particular moment I wish his arms were skinnier, or fatter, just a little less tough, because they’re crushing me and it hurts.

 

* * *

 

He spoke to Tooru quietly, and it didn’t really matter if Tooru understood what he was saying. What mattered was that Tooru knew that he was talking. And, indeed, Tooru wasn’t understanding a single word.

 

* * *

 

What is it you’re saying to me? Something about how it’s gonna be all right? Everything’s gonna be fine? Don’t make me laugh. You’re losing your mind, too. You think I don’t see that you hardly sleep at night, because you’re dreaming of murderers. We can’t help each other. I appreciate the thought, but really, it’s not gonna be all right.

 

* * *

 

They were both shaking as Hajime helped Tooru over to the bedroom, while Gemini sniffed at the messes. He helped Tooru change into clean pajamas, put him down into the bed, and kissed his forehead over and over and over again. Each time as if it were the last.

 

* * *

 

I hate myself for doing this, you know? I just wanted to cook you dinner, and now I’ve made a fucking mess and you have to clean everything up. I’m the one supposed to be cleaning up. That’s what I do. I hide messes and I clean them up and now I’m just fucking up everything.

 

* * *

 

Tooru’s breakdown left him so exhausted that he fell asleep almost instantly. Footsteps, heavy with all those burdens, disappeared from the room and the door was kept only slightly ajar.

 

* * *

 

I know what happens next. You clean up after me (the way I’m supposed to do for you), then you come back and you get into bed with me. You whisper whatever into my ear and I melt because that’s just what you do to me, you make me so happy without doing anything at all. Then you’ll notice that I’m still hiding my tears and you’ll start to yell at me. Why do you have to try and be strong all the time? Why do you have to push yourself so much? That’s what you’ll say. You’ll threaten to hit me the next time I do something so stupid, but that’s a lie. You never actually will, because that would defeat the purpose and if you hit me—really hit me—I would definitely leave you.

Then again, I think that’s a lie, too.  


	26. Chapter 26

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> two more chapters!!
> 
> for the translation of the Russian, scroll over the underlined words :)

**Chapter 26**

Tooru finally managed to finish his composition. It was on the same day that Hajime and Michiko had been scheduled to exchange their vows. It was also the same day that his mother called to tell him that his father had died. He thanked her for calling, told her he was sorry, said that if she needed him to come up he would—I know you loved him, Mama. She said that wasn’t necessary, and in her grief-stricken anger, she berated him for letting his father die like that--crying for you, Tooru. His last words, Tooru, were that he wanted to see you and apologize for whatever it was he did to make you hate him so much. He died crying over you. 

Tooru told her again that he was sorry, his voice cold, before he said good-bye and hung up and went about his daily business as if he’d never even received the call. His father had already been dead to him anyway. He just wished that his father had been able to remember what he’d done, so at least Tooru could have had the satisfaction of hating him properly. It wasn’t really fair that his last memory of his father was going to be his voice, crying out through horrible tears, begging him to explain why he never wanted to see him again. When Hajime came home, he didn’t even tell him.

But perhaps the news of his father’s death tapped into some hidden reserve of emotions, because after the phone call he was able to sit down at his piano and finish the composition. Then he played it over and over again, made his edits, and was finally satisfied. He would need to title it eventually, but for now he just called it elegy. He liked to think that if Rachmaninoff heard it, he’d approve. Clap him on the back, [Превосходно, красиво, преследует](https://translate.google.com/#auto/en/%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%B5%D0%B2%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%85%D0%BE%D0%B4%D0%BD%D0%BE%2C%20%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%B8%D0%B2%D0%BE%2C%20%D0%BF%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%81%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%B4%D1%83%D0%B5%D1%82). He was finally satisfied, and finally reassured by the prospects of teaching and composing for the rest of his life. Music was finding ways to weave into his life, even if he wasn’t the one playing. He could teach others, like Tobio, and write the music that they played. The betrayal of his fingers, he decided, holding his head high, wouldn’t be enough to take him away from the world of music that he so loved.

He called Takahiro to tell him he’d finished his first composition and he wanted it published, and Takahiro said he would get it done.

“So...modeling is still a no?” he teased.

“As beautiful as I am, it’s still a no.”

“Damn.”

Hajime called him later to say that he was staying late, that he wouldn’t be able to make it over that night, and that he would call him tomorrow morning.

“Don’t work yourself too hard,” Tooru said, pacing around his house and holding the phone to his ear. He walked with pointed toes, trying to make himself graceful for nobody. He fancied a glass of wine.

“I don’t really have a choice. We really have to catch these guys.”

“Are you close?”

“We don’t know.”

“Okay, well...what exactly are you going to be doing tonight?”

“We’re doing an undercover stint.”

“That sounds dangerous.”

“Yeah, well, we’re detectives.”

“Wakatoshi undercover. Ha.”

“Oh, he’s not going undercover. Just me. He’s covering from outside.”

“You’re going in by yourself?”

“Don’t worry. It’s not my first time, and we know what we’re doing.”

“I don’t like this idea.”

“Luckily, it’s not up to you. We think there’s a sex trafficking ring going on.”

“Yakuza are scary.”

“Yeah.”

“Who knows? Maybe your face will be enough to frighten them off.”

“I should just kick you.”

“Just be careful, okay? I’m not gonna sleep tonight thinking about it.”

“Sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have told you.”

“N-no, I’m glad that you tell me about your work.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. I should go.”

“Don’t be as stupid as usual.”

“Shut up.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Despite the lighthearted banter, Tooru really was worried, and it was true that he wasn’t going to be sleeping. All he could think about was the chance that Hajime would get into trouble. He’d seen enough movies and crime dramas to know that undercover stints almost never go smoothly. But, to soothe his racing heart, he reminded himself that Hajime had been doing this for a while. And Tooru trusted him. It wouldn’t quite make sense for him to trust Hajime with his own life, but not with his. He did have that glass of wine, in the hopes that he would relax. He put on some music, wished that Gemini were around for him to cuddle, and was in a mood strangely romantic. So he grabbed the notebook that he’d spent years writing notes in to Hajime up in heaven. He flipped through it.

_I’m so dramatic._

It was fascinating to see how his writing had evolved. For the first year his notes were practically incoherent in their grief and anger, and there were many more. The notes started spreading out and getting more and more thoughtful as the years went by. Always on Hajime’s birthday, always before a concert. Whenever Tooru’s heart was broken, the first person he went to was Hajime. Even now.

As he got to the last note, the one he’d written before his last concert, he had the strangest idea. He grabbed a pen, thankful that he could hold it solidly enough to write with his notoriously beautiful handwriting, and wrote a note. It wasn’t to Hajime, though. But it was a note that he’d been needing to write for a while, and he was astounded at the fact that the hadn’t thought of this idea before. And he really wasn’t sure why the idea popped into his head at that particular moment, when he’d been immersed in thoughts of Hajime.

_Dear Wakatoshi,_

_You’re so strange. I don’t know if I ever told you that I think you’re strange. Because on one hand, you are so kind. You tried so hard to understand what I needed, you always put me first, you only spoke with sweet words to me. You have this look in your eyes. Genuine, beautiful kindness and sincerity. On the other hand, you’re infuriatingly dense. You’re blunt and, despite your attempts to understand me, you never really could. It’s not your fault. I never told you enough for you to understand. But my god, you say and do the stupidest things! I always felt like there was a wall standing between you and everyone else around you—like you didn’t know what it meant to talk and understand people. And it’s not your fault, you sweet, dense man, it’s not your fault and that’s what’s so frustrating about it all._

_I think toward the end I tried to make you hate me, because I had convinced myself that I hated you. After months of lying to you and saying that I loved you. How unfair of me. You had every reason to hate me, every reason in the world, but you never let yourself hate me. There’s your stupidity, your true stupidity. You let yourself fall into my trap and I squeezed you dry._

_I know it seems like I’m blaming you, but really, it’s my fault. I should never have told you that I loved you. I shouldn’t have let you kiss me on the cheek after that first date, I shouldn’t have let you buy me drinks, I shouldn’t have let you say you loved me. And I certainly shouldn’t have let it go far enough for you to propose. Your heart was doomed to be broken from the moment we met because the truth, the real truth, is that I’m not a good person. You, so beautiful, are such a good person. And I’m not. I’m a bad person._

_I’m trying to tell you, in a pretty roundabout way, that I’m sorry. I hurt you so much, so much. In another life I would have loved you immensely. But in this life I never can. I can’t love somebody who devotes more to me than I devote to them. You’re important to me, so important to me, but I don’t love you and I never will._

_And I’m sorry._

_Warmly,_

_Tooru Oikawa._

He would never let Wakatoshi read the note, never. The note wasn’t really for him, ultimately. It was for Tooru.

 

* * *

 

It was around three in the morning, and Tooru was in that surreal place between sleep and wakefulness. The melodies of his composition were floating around in his head, and already he was looking forward to the next one. He was looking forward to Hajime coming home so that Tooru could play it for him. This is for you, I wrote this for you, because I love you so much, he would say. And Hajime would love it despite the fact that he couldn’t understand the little nuances of music and it would garner him at least a few kisses.

The sleepiness had been helping him stay calm, but the drunk-but-not-drunk mood was shattered when his phone began to ring and his heart shriveled. He answered the phone without even checking who was calling.

“Hello?”

It was a voice he didn’t recognize.

“Is this Tooru Oikawa?”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry to call you so late—I’m calling from the University of Tokyo Hospital.”

 

* * *

 

Tooru was sleep-deprived and frantic when he burst into the emergency waiting room. The first person he saw, his eyes magnetically drawn to him, was Hajime, sitting in the corner of the room with his head in his hands. Tooru called out to him. Hajime’s head snapped up, and in the next moment he had rushed into Tooru’s arms. The world was moving slowly around them, awfully slowly, and still they couldn’t quite grasp at anything.

“What happened?” Tooru asked. Hajime began to shake his head and his words, his mind, failed him as he tried to explain.

“I didn’t even notice the gun—how did I not notice the gun? I’m fucking trained to notice when someone’s about to pull a gun on me, you know? I didn’t even fucking notice it. I could’ve moved, you know, I could’ve disarmed him, I could’ve done anything, but I just stood there.”

“Hajime, slow down.”

Tooru was the furthest thing from calm, but if he wanted to be the person Hajime needed, he would have to create a façade of serenity. So he took a deep breath and sat down, forcing Hajime to do the same. He was panicked, his face pale and his words scrambled. His lips looked like they were trying so hard to say the words clearly but there was a glimmer of wildness in his eyes. That thing, that thing inside him that had bending and bending and bending, had finally snapped.

“Try and explain to me what happened.”

“I...I guess one of them figured out I was a cop. I don’t know how. And outside, Ushiwaka was getting suspicious that they knew, so he told me to get out of there. But I insisted on staying. I wanted to do what I’d been sent there to do, so I was stubborn. But Ushiwaka...he was worried. So he got prepared to go in and cover me.”

Hajime stopped, and then buried his head in his hands. Tooru held him, rubbed his back, gave him time to gather himself.

“What happened next?” he whispered patiently.

“I...it was happening so fast. I guess the guy, one of the yakuza...he pulled out a gun. Aimed right at me. U-Ushiwaka was ready, and as soon as he realized there was a gun he burst in. But the gun, the gun was aimed at _me_ , he was trying to shoot _me,_ and Ushiwaka—”

“Breathe, Hajime. Breathe.”

“He fucking saved my life. If I just hadn’t been so fucking stupid.”

“Stop blaming yourself. It’s not fair to either of you, and it’s not going to change what happened.”

“I don’t know what I’m gonna do if he dies.”

“He’s going to be fine.”

“The doctors said that the bullet hit his spinal cord. He could die.”

“They know what they’re doing. Just trust them for a little bit.”

“What if the surgery fails? What if they come walking through those doors just to tell us that he’s fucking dead?”

“Shh. Breathe. He’s going to be fine.”

The Moonlight Sonata was loud and dramatic in Tooru’s ears. He hated hospitals.

They sat like that for an hour, while Hajime continued murmuring, mumbling about how horrible he was, how he’d caused this, how if he’d _just listened_ none of it would’ve happened. While Tooru listened and responded with No, Don’t blame yourself, It’s going to be all right, You couldn’t have known. All while he held in his own breakdowns. He didn’t need anymore—his mind was still in such a fragile state and this was starting to break him again. But he couldn’t let Hajime see that for even a moment.

When the doctor came out, Hajime and Tooru held their breath. She took a deep breath, and then smiled at them.

“The surgery went well. He’s recovering. You can go in and see him soon.”

“Thank god,” Hajime breathed, letting his head hang. “Thank fucking god.”

“Thank you,” Tooru said to the doctor.

“No need to thank me. Though, you should know...”

They straightened up again as her face became solemn.

“The injury to his spinal cord was not totally repairable.”

“What? What does that mean?” Hajime pressed.

“It means we couldn’t fix everything. He’s paralyzed from the waist down.”

Tooru and Hajime, wide-eyed, just stared. It wasn’t quite registering.

“Does...does he know?” Tooru asked softly. She nodded.

“He could use some friends,” she added. So they followed her to earnest, tactless, beautiful Wakatoshi Ushijima’s hospital room, and Tooru wanted to curl up on the floor and cry, because he was still so fucking selfish.

 

* * *

 

I’m sitting on a throne. Standing beside me, Hajime puts a crown on my head. His hands are slow and careful, because the crown is heavy. It doesn’t feel heavy on my head, though. It feels light and natural. He continues to stand beside me and when I reach my ringed hand out, he kisses it with certainty and devotion on his lips. I want them all over my body.

But we’re not alone. Wakatoshi is on his knees in front of me, bowing and telling me that he’s ready to lay down his life for me. Whenever, wherever. If I want him to die right here he’ll gladly thrust his sword into his chest and die at my feet. My wish is his command, my word his law, my face his god. His willingness to be hurt makes me want to hurt him. I smile down at him while Hajime kisses my hand. What kind of twisted satisfaction is this? A satisfaction of holding life in my hands, I suppose. There’s power in that and power makes you crazy. I hold my leg out. Wakatoshi puts one hand behind my calf, the other on the side of my foot, and he kisses it. Somewhere in my kingdom, Tobio--or maybe just a past me--is playing Moonlight Sonata, so I begin to hum along.      


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is the final chapter!
> 
> Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for taking the time and energy to read my writing. It truly does mean the world to me that people read and enjoy the words that I put my entire soul into writing. You continue to inspire and motivate me to be a better writer and person every day! 
> 
> Shameless plug time: if you liked this story, I have plenty more on this account and my pseuds! I'm currently working on some more Haikyuu projects, so definitely expect to see me return to this fandom at least a few more times. 
> 
> Love you to the moon and back--enjoy the final chapter!
> 
> xoxo

**Chapter 27**

Hajime cried for half an hour and held Wakatoshi’s hand. The air in the hospital room was stale, dripping with IV fluid and hopelessness. Every beep from the monitors made the ground shake, and Tooru was afraid that if he stood there, in the doorway like some sort of twisted, voyeuristic passerby, listening for too long, those beeps would forever drown out the music that he had grown so accustomed to in his head. He couldn’t hear any music in those moments. Only the beeping and the sound of Hajime’s heart-wrenching sobs. And Wakatoshi—Wakatoshi’s silence was deafening. He lay there as if he really were dead, staring at the ceiling, eyelids slowly closing and slowly opening mechanically. Robotically. Tooru couldn’t take his eyes off Wakatoshi’s parched lips, as tight and straight as ever. The stoicism terrified him. It was the same stoicism he’d once looked to for comfort and stability, but at that moment it ripped him to shreds and laughed at him. He could only watch for a few seconds at a time, letting Wakatoshi’s figure wax and wane between clarity and fuzziness, before his gaze fell to his feet. Standing completely still, almost blending into the bloodstained floors. Or were those his fingers? When it came to blood, he could hardly tell anymore.

Interspersed among the sobs were Hajime’s desperate apologies. I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you, I’m sorry I couldn’t save you, I’m so sorry. It should’ve been me. Tooru considered leaving them alone, but couldn’t bring himself to step outside. So he stood and let his brain self-destruct, because that was the only thing left for it to do. Drown in all its sins—letting his father die like that, pulling Wakatoshi by a string only to cut it in half with a sadistic grin, holding onto Hajime with arms that were so strong and stiff that Hajime couldn’t breathe. All the suffering he’d caused blurred together and he was left feeling so drained that he couldn’t understand the concept of suffering at all anymore. What was happening in front of him wasn’t suffering. It was just life. Nothing was different today than any other day. The beat of his heart was steady. So, so steady.

When Hajime had grown pale and breathless, and Wakatoshi’s knuckles were turning red from how hard Hajime was squeezing them, Tooru stepped forward. Steps assured and strong, voice smooth and steady, fingers swollen.

“Hajime. Go to the cafeteria and get something to eat.”

Hajime began to shake his head and opened his mouth to speak, but Tooru interrupted him.

“Don’t argue. Just go. Take a smoke if you need it. Drink water. I’ll stay here with Ushiwaka.”

He helped Hajime stand up and led him to the door. In the doorway, he turned and looked Tooru in the eyes. There was something in his gaze, something accusatory. There was a secret they both knew, but neither was going to say. Hajime blinked once and the accusatory glare disappeared, and without another word he turned and walked down the hall toward the elevators. Tooru closed the door and took Hajime’s place in the seat next to Wakatoshi’s bed. He didn’t hold Wakatoshi’s hand.

“Why are you such a fool,” he heard himself whisper. Wakatoshi blinked and turned his head ever so slightly toward Tooru. Where there had once been kindness, stupidity, strength, there was now complete, darker-than-black emptiness. Tooru wrung his hands together and stared at that emptiness, refusing to look away. The Moonlight Sonata was so dim.

“You know I felt it? When Hajime told me what you two were doing tonight. I didn’t sleep.”

“Please don’t act like you were worried about me,” Wakatoshi said, finally breaking his silence. The spitefulness of his words washed over Tooru like water.

“I’m not.”

“Do you really hate me that much?”

“Hate you?” Tooru smiled dryly. “What reason could I possibly have to hate you?”

“Making you feel guilty.”

“You’d hardly be the first to do that.”

Wakatoshi blinked again, but wouldn’t turn away. He and Tooru were locked together.

“You might not believe me, but I think about you all the time,” Tooru continued.

“I believe you.”

“I was thinking about you tonight.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. I wrote you a letter.”

“I don’t want to read it.”

“Good, because I wasn’t going to give it to you.”

“I stopped listening to your music.” His fingers dug into the bedsheets, as if he were in excruciating pain. “I can’t bear to listen to even a second.”

Tooru clenched his teeth.

“Are you afraid, Wakatoshi?”

“Afraid.”

“Because you can’t walk anymore.”

“Oh. No.”

“No?”

Wakatoshi shook his head.

“I’m not afraid of anything.”

“Liar.”

“Do I seem like I’m lying?”

“No.”

“The only thing I was ever afraid of was living in a world without you. There’s nothing left to be afraid of.”

“Even now?”

“Yes.”

“Are you afraid of losing Hajime?”

Wakatoshi paused.

“No,” he replied.

“Do you love him?”

“I appreciate him as a partner.”

“You don’t care about him at all?”

“Of course I do.”

“He sat here crying for you and you didn’t say anything.”

“What am I going to say?”

“Accept his apologies, for one thing. Tell him you don’t regret what you did for him.”

“I didn’t do it for him.”

“Always such a _fool—_ ”

“You love him. That was enough of a reason.”

“I’ve changed my mind. I do hate you. I hate you with every fiber of my being.”

And then, when Tooru was least expecting it, Wakatoshi smiled.

“I know,” he said. Only then did Tooru reach out and take Wakatoshi’s hand. He kissed it softly. Then he reached his hand out and put it on Wakatoshi’s thigh, laying still beneath the blanket.

“You don’t feel a thing?” he murmured.

“Nothing,” Wakatoshi murmured back. Not once did Tooru see even a hint of a tear.

“And you’re still not afraid?”

“No.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know. Continue living.”

Tooru stood up, leaned forward, and put his lips against Wakatoshi’s cold, sweat-covered forehead.

“Okay,” he said.

 

* * *

 

On a day he was certain his fingers could handle it, Tooru asked Issei and Takahiro to come over and help him record. First, he recorded a cover of “Piano Man,” singing and all. Then he recorded his own composition, the elegy he had composed for Hajime. They asked him what to title it—for publication purposes.

“Call it The Piano Man’s Elegy,” he replied.

 

* * *

 

Hajime and Tooru visited Wakatoshi as often as they could. While he was recovering they brought him things to read and recommended podcasts and weird, fucked up YouTube videos. They were there when they first put him into the wheelchair, when they directed him to physical therapy, when they suggested that he see a psychiatrist. Tooru and Hajime took turns wheeling him through the hospital gardens. They weren’t sure when he was going to be discharged. They weren’t sure how.

In the meantime, Hajime took a leave from work.

At the very least, he said, he needed a break.

 

* * *

 

Tobio was improving faster than Tooru could keep up with.

“How was that, Oikawa-sensei?”

“Perfect. Perfect, Tobio-chan. Brilliant, sweet Tobio-chan.”

“Thank you.”

A pinch to his cheek. A kiss.

 

* * *

 

On a day that Tooru happened to be taking Wakatoshi to his physical therapy, the therapist asked to talk to them after the session. She walked with them to the front desk and handed Wakatoshi a brochure with a lush, green landscape on the front and English writing.

“It’s a rehabilitation center in America,” she said. “It’s very well known and I think it could help you a lot.”

“Thank you,” Wakatoshi said. Emotionless. “I’ll think about it.”

 

* * *

 

A few days after that, Hajime was in the bathroom and Tooru was in the room with Wakatoshi. Arguing.

“I don’t want it like this,” Wakatoshi said, shaking his head.

“It’s never been about what you want,” Tooru replied. “It’s about what I want. Right?”

“You don’t want this, either.”

“Don’t try to presume what I do or don’t want.”

“If I ever hurt you, I would hate myself forever.”

“We’re past hurt, Wakatoshi. You love me, don’t you?”

“But you don’t love me.”

“What does it matter anymore?”

Hajime came back into the room and they fell silent.

 

* * *

 

He was having another nightmare, so Tooru cradled his head and kissed his temple. It was as much for him as it was for Hajime. In the darkness, their fears were coming alive and dancing a horrible deadly tango together and he wanted to hold Hajime so badly. It wasn’t just a desire, it was a physical need, and his limbs were trembling with that need. He held Hajime to him and buried his face in Hajime’s hair, to feel it as closely as he could. He began to cry when Hajime breathed out words of gratitude and endless love against his neck, began to cry harder when Hajime asked him why he was crying.

“Just say you love me again, say you love me and you’ll never stop,” Tooru gasped.

“I love you, and I’ll never stop.”

They fell beneath the covers like rocks falling to the bottom of the ocean to sit for the rest of eternity and crumble under the pressure. Even in the darkness, Tooru kept his eyes open so he could memorize every detail of Hajime’s silhouette. The bumps and ridges of his shoulder, elbow, straight torso and thick legs. Everything that he loved so desperately—he wished he could draw. What he would have given to be able to draw Hajime’s silhouette at that moment, just so he could be certain that he knew it. If he ever forgot it, he would never forgive himself.

 

* * *

 

It was a selfish thing to do. He had some weird, distorted idea of redemption and atonement in his head. Like punishing himself, suffering for the sake of someone else, was the first step to eradicating the black in his soul and erasing his sins. They would never be fully erased—of course he knew that. Their ramifications were too deeply ingrained in the lives of those he’d hurt, but if he started now, hurt them one last time, he could live the rest of his life a redeemed man. But it was selfish, it was so selfish, it was because he wanted to be comfortable with himself and wanted to be able to look at himself in the mirror without feeling such intense loathing.

He had come to the conclusion that he was just inherently selfish, and he would have to live with that. As long as he made sacrifices to make up for it, it would be okay.

 

* * *

 

Wakatoshi had kept the ring all this time. He had never even thought about getting rid of it because hope is such a stubborn thing.

It fit Tooru’s finger perfectly.

 

* * *

 

At their last lesson, Tobio cried.

He didn’t just cry—cry wasn’t the right word.

He screamed as if he were being ripped apart from the inside out.

It started when, after their lesson had ended, Tobio stood up from the piano bench only to find Tooru kneeling in front of him. He held Tobio’s little hands and kissed them. Koushi was waiting in the doorway.

“What’s wrong? You look sad, Oikawa-sensei.”

“I...I am sad, darling.”

“How come?”

“Because this is our last lesson.”

Tobio’s eyes went wide and he shook his head.

“Our last lesson? What do you mean?”

“I have to leave.”

Tobio kept shaking his head, and Tooru squeezed his hands harder. They were starting to sweat.

“B-but...but you said that...”

“I’m sorry, Tobio-chan.”

“You said that you’d always teach me. Th-that you’d come watch me every time I played...you said you wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“I know. I know, I did say those things.”

Despite his attempts to be strong, his lower lip began to quiver dangerously, and it ripped Tooru’s heart from his chest. He had thought himself numb to everything—but he wasn’t numb to this. As the tears slipped from Tobio’s round blue eyes, Tooru pulled him into his chest.

“I thought you loved me,” Tobio said.

“I would never lie to you about that.”

“Then why don’t you want to teach me anymore? Did I make you angry? Did I do something wrong?”

“No, my sweet boy, no. If I could, I would teach you until the day I die.”

“Did I say something to make you stop loving me?”

He began to sob, and Tooru squeezed him tight and smoothed his hair. His heart was aching so much. He thought for a moment that he was dying—he wished that he were. Anything to spare himself this torture. The torture of hearing Tobio’s sobs in his ear, feeling his tiny body quiver with sadness.

“But I don’t want you to go,” he cried.

When Koushi tried to tell Tobio it was time to leave, he started to throw a tantrum. He held onto Tooru for dear life and screamed that he didn’t want to leave, he wanted to stay there, because he loved Oikawa-sensei and wanted to be his student forever.

“Oikawa-sensei has to leave, Tobio,” Koushi said, holding back his own tears. He held Tobio’s waist and tried to pull him away, but he clung to Tooru’s neck and continued to scream.

“No! I don’t wanna leave! Oikawa-sensei!”

Koushi had to tear Tobio off, and drag him kicking and screaming to the door. Tooru didn’t even have the strength to stand up and see them off. He could do nothing but kneel, watch as Tobio reached for him and screamed his name.

“You are my most brilliant student, Tobio-chan,” he said. “Never forget how special you are.”

“Don’t make me leave! I wanna stay! Please don’t leave me all alone!”

“And never forget how happy you made me. Never forget that I love you.”

When the door was finally closed and Tobio’s ear-shattering screams were just echoes, Tooru lay down on the floor and wept, because he had just lost the one thing that he had truly believed in until the very end.

 

* * *

 

Hajime knew. Maybe he’d predicted. But when he walked into Tooru’s house and saw the storage boxes and luggage he wasn’t surprised. He wasn’t surprised, but he was absolutely furious.

“Do you think you’re doing anyone any favors here? Huh? You think you’re actually doing something useful? How dare you try and decide what’s best for everyone else!”

“I’m sorry.”

“Like hell you are! You think this is fair?”

“Of course not.”

“I fucking love you, you stupid idiot, I love you so much it hurts.”

“I don’t think I ever needed to say it for you to know that I love you. And that I always will.”

Hajime lifted his hand, as if about to slap him, but then lowered it and fell into Tooru’s arms instead.

“I can’t do this to you. I won’t stay if it means destroying you. Even if it hurts. I won’t do it.”

“You’re not destroying me.”

“I’ve already destroyed Wakatoshi. I won’t destroy you, too.”

 

* * *

 

He left Hajime the original sheet music for his composition, the recordings, and the notebook that he had spent years writing in.

 

* * *

 

“All those years ago, I thought you had really just left me alone, and I hated you so much. And now you really are leaving me.”

“Yes. I am.”

“You’re so shitty.”

“Yes.”

“Then why don’t I hate you?”

 

* * *

 

The night before Tooru’s flight to New York, with a layover in Shanghai, he and Hajime made love. They made love with every bit they had. They left the bedsheets ripped to shreds, the air warm and reverberating with their voices, the house haunted with the way they touched each other. They said I love you more times than they could count, and they meant it more and more each time. It never lost its meaning—they could have cried it out into infinity and it never would have lost its meaning. Tooru swallowed Hajime’s soul and tasted it, breathed it, let it settle into his skin so that he could feel it prickling him, a welcome and painful thorn in his side, for the rest of his life. He smiled at the delicious thought. He condemned himself to hell, and vowed that every moment for the rest of his life, he would let Hajime destroy him.

 

* * *

 

Wakatoshi broke down on the airplane, and everybody could hear him. He squeezed Tooru’s hand and shed tears against his palm. Because when Tooru said he loved him, he could see that he was lying. It hurt a little bit, because Tooru’s hands were flaring up and he had forgotten to take his medications.

“Is it really such a big deal?” Tooru asked himself. “What does the truth matter?”

He assured Wakatoshi that he would never leave him. He would stay with him, take care of him, love him forever. Even if Wakatoshi didn’t believe him, maybe he could live in this façade with Tooru.

“It’s okay now,” he murmured. “You can let yourself love me as much as you want.”

 

* * *

 

Tooru Oikawa, the famous pianist with the red, twisted fingers, vowed as soon as he set foot in America that he would never listen to “Piano Man” ever again. 


End file.
